Aggarwal front runner for Chief Secy post

Pratibha Chauhan

Tribune News Service

Shimla, September 29

A 1985-batch IAS officer BK Aggarwal seems to be the final choice for being appointed the successor to Chief Secretary Vineet Chawdhry who will retire on Sunday.

Though there is no confirmation about who will be the choice of Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, sources said Aggarwal could be the favoured one. He is serving as Additional Chief Secretary, Health and Home, after returning from the Central deputation.

The Chief Minister on Saturday returned to the state capital and could take a call late in the evening or tomorrow.

The main contenders for the post include seniormost IAS officers Upma Chawdhry, wife of Chief Secretary Vineet Chawdhry, and Srikand Baldi. Upma is serving as Director of the Lal Bahadur Shastri Academy at Mussoorie but is keen to return to assume the top administrative post. Baldi is posted as Princiapl Secretary to the CM and is also a strong contender.

Upma is from the 1983 batch and had been superceded, along with her husband, when VC Pharka was made the Chief Secretary by the previous Congress regime in June 2016. Baldi on the other hand is also of the 1985 batch as Aggarwal. Besides these two officers, Manisha Nanda, ACS, Public Works and Revenue Department, and Sanjeev Gupta, serving in Delhi, are also from the 1985 batch but junior to Aggarwal.

Though Pharka, former Chief Secretary, is from the 1983 batch, he had been removed by the BJP regime and appointed adviser. Others senior to Aggarwal and Baldi, but posted in Delhi, are Bharti Sihag and Asha Ram Sihag (both 1983 batch) and Tarun Sridhar and Arvind Mehta (both 1984 batch). As such, there is only Pharka, senior to Aggarwal, who is posted in Himachal, rest all others are serving outside the state.

There is a virtual scramble between serving and retired IAS, IPS and Forest Services officers to get post-retirement appointments. Twelve officers have applied for two posts of Administrative Member in the State Administrative Tribunal (SAT). The two posts have fallen vacant on the completion of the term of former Chief Secretary Harinder Hira and retired IAS officer Prem Kumar.

Those who have applied for the posts include Pharka, Vineet Chawdhry, PC Dhiman (all IAS officer), Shamsher Singh Negi and Sanjeeva Pandey (Indian Forest Services) and Shyama Dogra, a lawyer.

Some other serving officers, including Baldi, who will retire in December 2019, are in the race for the post of chairperson, Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA), to be constituted shortly. Vineet Chawdhry too could also be made RERA head.

Vineet Chawdhry given farewell

Shimla: Chief Secretary Vineet Chawdhry will retire on Sunday. He was an IAS officer of the 1982 batch and served the Centre and Himachal Government for nearly 36 years.  Addressing officers and employees of the Secretariat during the farewell function, Chawdhry said, “We all should work for the welfare of public and redressal of their grievances should be dealt with honestly.” He said a positive attitude with team spirit was essential to execute any work and thanked all officers and employees, who had supported him during his tenure. Additional Chief Secretary BK Agarwal said Chawdhry believed in execution of works and his associate officers and employees learnt a lot from him. He said the state government’s Jan Manch had become a big platform of direct communication with public and Chawdhry played an important role in the framework of Jan Manch. 

Decision likely today

• Though there is no confirmation about who will be the final choice of Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, sources said BK Aggarwal could be the favoured one 
• He is serving as Additional Chief Secretary, Health and Home
• The Chief Minister could take a call late in the evening or Sunday.