WITH women officers beginning to dominate the Indian Railway Accounts Service (IRAS), those in the sister railway services have coined a new informal name to the cadre – Sari, which incidentally is the reverse of the abbreviation – IRAS.
For those not so familiar with Indian culture, Sari is an elegant dress worn by Indian women (see picture), and is made popular abroad by Bollywood actresses.
It’s learnt that most women now prefer to join this service, and at times weigh it above Indian Railway Traffic Service (IRTS), Indian Railway Personnel Services (IRPS) etc. In fact, the leadership position of the IRAS has also been with women officers. Sowmya Raghavan, financial commission of Indian Railways at the rank of secretary to the government of India, is currently the top IRAS officer.
Though officers of other cadres might call it “Sari”, but the first IRAS officer recruited in 1930 happened to be a man -- C T Venugopal. Also, the first IRAS financial commissioner (K S Bhandari in 1939) and the first IRAS officer becoming secretary to government of India (Y T Shah in 1944) were both men. The first lady IRAS officer was Priya Prakash of 1957 batch, and the first woman IRAS to become financial commissioner in Indian Railways was Vijayalakshmi Viswanathan.
Significantly, the government has repeatedly said now that it would encourage more women to join it. According to a census, 9.68% of Central government employees were women in 2004. The census was conducted by the directorate general of employment & training under the ministry of labour and employment.
Pati, Patni & … stands correct The appointments committee of the cabinet (ACC) has approved the proposal to appoint Anjali Prasad, a 1983 batch IAS of Uttarakhand cadre as joint secretary, in the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP), in the pay band of Rs 37400-67000, (PB-4) plus grade pay of Rs 10000, for a period of five years from the date of assumption of charge of the post or until further orders. On July 16, babu blogger in his post “Yet another Pati, Patni & Post tale: Anjali Prasad to replace her husband as DIPP joint secretary”, wrote that Mrs Prasad would get the post which has been lying vacant after her husband N N Prasad, a 1981 batch Uttarakhand cadre IAS joined Geneva-based world intellectual property organization (WIPO) a couple of months ago. Action & Appointments a) The proposal of the ministry of home affairs for extension of inter-cadre deputation of Chitrangad, IPS (UP, 1996) from Uttarakhand to Uttar Pradesh for a period of two years beyond August 25, 2008 has been approved. b) Akshay Kumar Rout, an IIS officer of 1984 batch has been appointed as director general (information education & communication) in Election Commission of India at a joint secretary level for five years.
IN YET another tale of Pati, Patni and Post, a 1983 batch Uttaranchal cadre IAS Anjali Prasad may join the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP) under the ministry of commerce and industry as a joint secretary, the post which is lying vacant after her husband N N Prasad, a 1981 batch Uttaranchal cadre IAS got a foreign posting couple of months ago.
This is, however, a case where the wife incidentally receives the same post held by her husband earlier, unlike BoI’s earlier tale of “Pati, Patni and Post” in which then commerce secretary and present home secretary G K Pillai was competing with his wife labour secretary Sudha Pillai to clinch the cabinet secretary’s post. But neither of those 1972 batch Kerala cadre IAS succeeded as the current incumbent K M Chandrasekhar got one year’s extension.
Significantly, Ms Prasad, a product of Delhi School of Economics, who held various responsibilities at the state level in the field of industry, commerce and finance, also had diplomas on WTO dispute settlement and WIPO diploma in Intellectual Property Rights (IPR).
Her husband Mr Prasad, who as a joint secretary in DIPP played a key role in sensitizing the IPR issues, joined as the Chef De Cabinet to the Director General of WIPO, Dr Francis Gurry in Geneva two months ago. The WIPO is the world intellectual property organization and one of the 16 specialised agencies under the United Nations.
Ms Prasad is the daughter of former IAS, A N Verma who served as the principal secretary to Prime Minister during Narasimha Rao’s time.