Miffed with Ratna, Jadhav, Siddaramaiah may appoint dark horse' Khuntia as CS
Bengaluru: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah is reportedly very miffed with the “adverse” media reports against the two top bureaucrats in Karnataka – the incumbent Chief Secretary Arvind Jadhav and Additional Chief Secretary K. Ratna Prabha – and is likely to appoint the next chief secretary after “careful deliberation to avoid any further embarrassment and damage to the image of the government,” said an officer on condition of anonymity.
Even as sources close to the chief minister told this newspaper that Mr Siddaramaiah will neither “discuss” nor “divulge” the name of his next CS, the candidature of the senior most ACS Subhash Chandra Khuntia, who is currently on Central deputation as Secretary, School Education & Literacy, Ministry of Human Resource & Development, is reportedly being considered for the top post.
The top contenders for the CS post include 1981 batch IAS officers – Dr. Khuntia and Ms Ratna Prabha and Mr S.K. Patanayak, secretary, Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare, Government of India, of 1982 batch.
On Mr Jadhav, the officer said that the chief minister will “not give in to media trial and will wait for the AG’s report. The Anti Corruption Bureau is also investigating the matter”. He also said that there could be a difficulty if the AG gave the CS a clean chit and the ACB charged him for illegality. “Will the ACB be able to go against the State’s top law officer?” he asked.
Mr Jadhav is caught in the midst of a land controversy involving his mother. Ms Ratna Prabha, who was given a clean chit by the Andhra Pradesh High Court and Supreme Court in an old CBI case pertaining to alleged illegal land allotment to Indu Tech zone in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh during her stint as secretary, Information Technology and Communications, is now allegedly faced with a problem after the Department of Personnel and Training has reportedly directed the Telangana government to take a timely decision on initiating penalty proceedings against her and another IAS officer, B.P. Acharya, who was also an accused in the same case. The DoPT in December last year had written to the state governments to initiate disciplinary action against the officers, he said.
