As many as 48 senior civil servants have been transferred, something that has never before happened at the Centre
The government transferred as many as 48 senior civil servants late on Tuesday night in what is perhaps the most significant reshuffle of senior bureaucrats at the Centre.
The transfers were announced on the website of the department of personnel and training, the nodal ministry for bureaucratic appointments, some four months after the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government took office.
“This is the first time that such transfers have happened en masse at the Centre,” said one of the transferred officials who did not wish to be identified.
State governments are known to effect such bulk transfers, but it has never before happened at the Centre.
“They have brought in several new people from states. The move seems (designed) to place their own people in sensitive posts in areas of coal, petroleum, finance and foreign ministries,” another bureaucrat aware of the situation said on condition of anonymity. “Some of the old ones have been sent to obscure positions”
While 39 officers belong to the Indian Administrative Service, the others belong to allied services including the Indian Forest Service, Indian Postal Service, Indian Audits and Accounts Service, Indian Civil Accounts Service and the Central Secretariat Service.
The transfers are of officers at the level of joint secretary or above.
“The concerned ministry has no say in such appointments any more. The decisions are being taken directly by the prime minister,” the second person cited above said. Read full story
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