Govt gives nod to Anuj Gupta's appointment as railway minister’s OSD; forest officer Ms. TJ Kavitha shifted as PS to MoS, Skill Dev

Ms. TJ Kavitha, a 2000 batch Rajasthan cadre Indian Forest Service (IFoS) officer, was on Friday appointed as the private secretary to the minister of state for skill development and entrepreneurship Anant Kumar Hedge “in relaxation of the cooling off requirement”. Significantly, her appointment was made after the curtailment of her...

Know more about the first three 2000 batch IAS posted as GoI joint secretaries

UNION joint secretary is a position being held by officers with a wide age-gap; they belong to a seniority gap of 10 to 12 years as well. With the three 2000 batch IAS officers getting appointed as GoI joint secretaries just days after 26 of the batch got empaneled, they are without doubt the junior-most, if not the youngest. Know more about these three 2000 batch IAS — Dr N Saravana Kumar (Bihar cadre), Niranjan Kumar Sudhansu (Maharashtra cadre) and S Suresh Kumar (Andhra Pradesh cadre): 

17 JS appointed; 3 IAS from 2000 batch become joint secretaries; 1 forest service officer gets berth in defence

THE government on Monday appointed 17 new joint secretaries including three IAS from 2000 batch, apart from prematurely repatriating one officer. The appointments also saw a 1990 batch income-tax officer (IRS-IT), Ms Ruchika Chaudhry Govil, as the new joint secretary in the steel ministry, and an Indian Forest Service (IFoS) officer — Amit Sahai of 1987 batch — getting berth in the department of defence production as JS. Here are the details of the 18 appointments: 

26 IAS officers of 2000 batch empaneled as JS; “…we should promote our 1997-98 batches to Commissioner level”, appeal revenue officers

THE anguish displayed by Group “A” officers belonging to various Central Services against early promotion of IAS officers, is an old story; but have you noticed any Central service association appealing to the government regarding their promotion in the backdrop of empanelment of IAS — and that too all in a Twitter post? Here it is. IRS (Customs and Central Excise) Association in a Tweet on Friday morning pinged CBEC (Central Board of Excise and Customs) about the need to promote their 1997-98 batches officers to the rank of...

DoPT gets two new directors— Rajul Bhatt, Shri Prakash Dubey

Shri Prakash Dubey, IRS-IT

TWO officers — 2000 batch Indian Postal Service (IPoS) officer Ms Rajul Bhatt and 2001 batch IRS-IT Shri Prakash Dubey—have been appointed as directors in the department of personnel and training (DoPT), Government of India. Ms Bhatt, 40, was a…

Amit Gupta in Limca Book of Records: How this UP IAS turns frequent transfers into a lifelong asset

FOR civil servants, one of the easy punishments being crafted by political leadership, is frequent transfers. We have all heard about many victims, most notable being Ashok Khemka of Haryana cadre, just to mention one. But meet this 2000 batch Uttar Pradesh cadre IAS -- Amit Gupta who turned this liability of frequent transfers into a lifetime asset. Limca Book of Records, the annual reference book that documents human and natural world records, has issued a certificate to Gupta for his record of…

CBI raids at residence of SM Krishna’s ex-private secretary and UP cadre IAS K Dhanalakshmi Gowda

THE Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has raided the residences of K Dhanalakshmi Gowda, a 2000 batch UP cadre IAS and former private secretary to India’s foreign minister SM Krishna, in Delhi and Bangalore, and recovered assets of about Rs 3.15 crore including cash. Dhanalakshmi, who is currently a deputy secretary in the ministry of social justice and empowerment, has been on investigators’ radar as there were suspicions that the 39-old woman IAS officer could have been linked to a case related to allotment of land for Tronica city project in Ghaziabad at a throwaway price. She was then the joint MD of UP Small Industries Corporation, Kanpur. In that case, the CBI had earlier raided engineer Arun Kumar Mishra’s houses in which carpenters were engaged to saw off the beds so as to spot cash.

It is alleged that Dhanalakshmi acquired huge amount of moveable and immovable assets in the name of her mother as well. The officer, originally hailing from Karnataka, was Krishna’s private secretary between November 2010 and June 2011, after which she was placed under compulsory wait till August, 2011. A cost accountant by profession before joining IAS, Dhanalakshmi is still staying at the residential complex of ministry of external affairs. India’s foreign office has distanced itself from the minister’s former private secretary as she left Krishna’s office in June 2011. Also, it is believed that she might have acquired illegal assets during her posting in UP.

Action and Appointments

a) Amitabh Ranjan, a 1979 batch Maharashtra cadre IAS, presently additional secretary in the department of administrative reforms and public grievances, has been appointed as additional secretary in the department of revenue under finance ministry.

b) Madhusudan Prasad, a 1981 batch Haryana cadre IAS, has been appointed as additional secretary in the department of commerce.

c) Rajive Kumar, a 1981 batch UP cadre IAS, has been appointed as additional secretary in Cabinet Secretariat on in-situ basis.