The Hindu : New Delhi News : Bureaucratic reshuffle

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Friday, Apr 22, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

Bureaucratic reshuffle

Staff Reporter

Reena Ray is the new Secretary for Education Despite the reshuffle the Delhi Government is facing shortage of senior officers and finding it difficult to keep up the pace of development.

NEW DELHI: Moving in to fill a yawing gap in the Capital's bureaucratic set-up caused by the retirement or transfer of many senior officials during the past few months, the Delhi Government on Thursday carried out a bureaucratic reshuffle appointing Reena Ray, IAS, as the new State Secretary for Education, Art, Culture and Languages. She will take over from the Principal Secretary (Urban Development), O.P.Kelkar, who was holding additional charge of these posts.

Ms. Ray, who belongs to the 1984 batch of the IAS, was Additional Commissioner, Municipal Corporation of Delhi, where she was instrumental in executing the overhauled new mid-day meal project that has been received well.

In addition, she was also instrumental in triggering off computerisation at the primary level and giving a new thrust to the educational activities in the Corporation.

She is understood to have a keen interest in the field of education and that seems to have clinched the issue in her favour. Ms. Ray will succeed Geeta Sagar who retired from service last month.

Anand Prakash (IAS-1979), Special Commissioner-cum-Special Secretary (Health and Family Welfare) and Project Director (CATS), has been transferred and posted as Chairman of the Delhi Subordinate Services Selection Board, relieving Mr. Kelkar of additional charge. S.C. Poddar (IAS-1987) on joining duty with the Delhi Government has been posted as Additional Commissioner, MCD, on deputation in place of Ms. Ray.

However, despite these postings and transfers, a large number of posts at the top level still remain acant even as senior officials of calibre have been made to cool their heels in insignificant posts.

The Delhi Government has been faced with a serious shortage of senior officers and has been finding it difficult to keep up the pace of development. Nearly a dozen posts are lying either vacant or being handled as additional charge by some other official indicating the crisis faced by the Administration in providing good governance.

Though the Delhi Government has made a special requisition to the Union Home Ministry to provide it with at least six IAS officials as an interim measure, the matter is still hanging fire.

R. Narainswami, Principal Secretary (Home), continues to hold charge of Principal Secretary (Finance) for almost one year now. In addition to his duties as Sales Tax Commissioner, R.K. Verma also holds additional charge of Principal Secretary (Planning).

The posts of Principal Secretary (GAD) have been lying vacant as both Geeta Sagar and Narendra Prasad retired from service last month. Similarly, the post of Secretary (Art, Culture and Languages) is also lying vacant for quite some time now.

The DTC Managing Director, Sanjeev Sahai, holds additional charge of four posts. In addition to holding the additional charge of DTC Chairman, he is also holding additional charge of Commissioner (Transport), Secretary (Transport) and OSD (DMRC).

The Delhi State Industrial Development Corporation (DSIDC) Chairman, Jalaj Srivastava, is also holding the additional charge of Principal Secretary (Industries) for the past few months.

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