5 secretaries in 6 departments, ministries are on leave; Govt entrusts additional charge to fellow secretaries

IT’S not unusual. But secretaries in as many as six ministries or departments are currently on leave, forcing the Central government to give additional charge of the posts to fellow secretaries, mostly belonging to allied ministries. The ministries or departments where the secretaries are now on leave include the ministry of environment, forest and climate change, ministry of new and renewable energy, department of administrative reforms and public grievances, department of pensions and pensioners' welfare, department of official language and the department of heavy industries. These are in additional to two other ministries — ministry of road transport and highways and department of telecom — where there is no…

full-time secretaries. Let’s first find out who are the five new secretaries who have been entrusted additional charge of secretaries’ posts in six departments/ministries. 

1. BP Sharma, 1981 batch Bihar cadre IAS, currently DoPT secretary, has been given additional charge of the post of secretary in two departments — the department of administrative reforms and public grievances and also department of pensions and pensioners' welfare — from May 13 to May 30, 2017 when incumbent secretary and 1991 batch Andhra Pradesh cadre IAS C Viswanath is on leave.

2. Ms Sanjeevanee Kutty, 1983 batch Maharashtra cadre IAS who is now secretary in the department of border management, has been given additional charge of the post of secretary, department of official language from May 15, 2017 to May 21, 2017 when incumbent secretary and 1982 batch IAS PK Jha is on leave.

3. Pradeep Kumar Pujari, 1981 batch Gujarat cadre IAS and current power secretary, has been given additional charge of post of secretary in the ministry of new and renewable energy from May 15, 2017 to June 2, 2017 when incumbent secretary and 1983 batch UP cadre IAS Rajeev Kapoor is on leave. 

4. Civil aviation secretary Rajiv Nayan Choubey has been given additional charge of post of environment secretary from May 10 to 21, 2017 as secretary Ajay Narayan Jha is on leave during that period. 

5. DPE secretary Ms Seema Bahuguna has been given additional charge of secretary, heavy industries from May 10 to 21, 2017 as secretary Girish Shankar is on leave during the period. 

Further, there’s no full secretaries in the ministry of road transport and highways and the department of telecommunication, both considered very important core sector ministries. Rajive Kumar, 1981 batch UP cadre lAS and present shipping secretary has been handling additional charge of post of secretary, ministry of road transport and highways whereas Ms Aruna Sundararajan, 1982 batch Kerala cadre IAS and current secretary in the ministry of electronics and information technology is also holding additional charge as secretary in the department of telecommunications (DoT).