Bhubaneswar: Senior IAS officer Manoj Ahuja was Friday appointed as the chief secretary of Odisha. He will take charge from the incumbent CS Pradeep Kumar Jena on June 30. The 1990-batch Odisha-cadre officer Ahuja, who was serving as the Union agriculture and farmers’ welfare secretary, had recently returned to the state following a requisition by the state government.
Though there were some other contenders like Nitin Chandra, Anu Garg and Satyabrata Sahu for the post, the government chose Ahuja as he is the senior most bureaucrat in the state cadres’ list.
Sources in the state government said the chief secretary, who is known for his reform measures, is expected to make use of his experience and expertise to galvanise the state administrative machinery.
“I’m very happy to be appointed as the chief secretary of Odisha. I will try my best to use my experience and expertise for the development of Odisha,” Ahuja told reporters in New Delhi.
Deputy Chief Minister Kanak Vardhan Singhdeo said, “The BJP government is committed to bring economic prosperity to the state developing all sectors of the economy. The new chief secretary will join duty on Saturday. Once he joins, he will contribute to our Vikshit Odisha mission.”
Sahadev Sahoo, former Odisha chief secretary, said the new CS has to uplift the agriculture sector as well as focus on the completion of the development projects undertaken by the previous BJD government.
In fact, during the previous government, the administrative machinery had completely been “defunct” as all powers were concentrated in the hands of one man — V Karthikeyan Pandian. A special post called 5T (Teamwork, Transparency, Technology, Time, and Transformation,) was created for him ostensibly to allow him to supersede other bureaucrats.
“Now, the new chief secretary Manoj Ahuja has to salvage the bureaucracy from that state of subjugation and allow the bureaucrats to work as per their expertise and experiences,” said senior journalist Prasanna Mohanty.
