New Delhi, July 12: Prime Minister Narendra Modi tonight completed the cabinet mop-up operation. He dropped Najma Heptullah and a birthday boy who was spared the blushes, relocated Babul Supriyo to a lower-profile ministry and promoted Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi.

Najma is 76 - above the 75-age-cap Modi has set for ministers - and resigned as minority affairs minister as soon as she returned from the US and on a day the Prime Minister returned from Africa.

Najma thanked Modi, clarified that she resigned because of "personal reasons" and said she would "always be available for any responsibility given to me in future" - which was viewed as a hint that she is available to assume a governorship or the vice-president's post. BJP sources said Modi never took kindly to such exhortations.

Junior minister Supriyo, the Asansol MP and a playback singer, was shifted to heavy industries and public enterprises from the higher-profile urban development.

"It came as a bolt from the blue but blue is certainly a pretty colour for me," Supriyo told ANI News.

Supriyo was attached as a junior minister to M. Venkaiah Naidu. Sources said the young MP's perennial complaint was he was "not given work". Supriyo will now work with a "more accommodative" Anant Geete of the Shiv Sena.

Naqvi, who was Najma's junior minister, was promoted as minister of state with independent charge of minority affairs. He retains his earlier responsibility as junior minister for parliamentary affairs.

"It's great news, I feel honoured," Naqvi told The Telegraph. He is one of the handful of Muslims who has remained with the BJP through communal convulsions. His wife is a relative of the former RSS sarsanghachalak, Rajendra Singh (Rajju Bhaiyya).

The other minister to be dropped was G.M. Siddeshwara, who was Geete's deputy.

At 64, Siddeshwara is well below the age ceiling but was reportedly rated as an "under-performer".

Sources said he was expected to go with five other ministers last week itself. But he sought time because on July 5, when the shuffle was announced, he was celebrating his birthday at a public meeting in his constituency in Karnataka. "He asked the party not to embarrass him by forcing his rally to be called off. The leaders agreed," a source said.

The last of the ministerial tweaks over, Modi is expected to clear the appointments of governors on July 16.