Dilli Ka Babu
Power slot
A relatively lowly vacant post of desk officer at the powerful National Advisory Council (NAC) has attracted a lot of interest in babu circles. The most obvious reason is that the chosen official will not just get to work closely with UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, who heads the NAC, but also get a VVIP address to operate from. Apparently, the PMO has sent out a letter to various ministries seeking applicants for the desk officer’s post.
One can safely assume that there will be a lot of interest in the position among eligible babus. The NAC is currently headed by 1974 batch retired IAS officer Rita Sharma, who runs a small yet efficient team. She is a batchmate of Pulok Chatterji, the powerful principal secretary to the Prime Minister and a close confidante of Mrs Gandhi. Clearly, it’s not every day that babus get an opportunity to work directly with the Congress high command.
Hot seat
The drubbing of the Congress in the recent Andhra Pradesh by-poll was widely expected, but further embarrassment for the Kiran Reddy government has flowed, unexpectedly, from the Hyderabad bench of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), which has set aside the appointment of V. Dinesh Reddy as the director-general of police (DGP) of Andhra Pradesh. Mr Reddy was appointed by the state government, ignoring the claim of Gautam Kumar, a senior IPS officer of the 1975 batch, who then approached the CAT on being superseded.
Sources say that the state government had similarly bungled last year when the CAT had set aside the appointment of K. Aravinda Rao as the DGP. So this makes it twice in a row. The tribunal has now directed the state government to appoint a new officer within three weeks. Hopefully, the government will manage to find someone who can stick to this hot seat.
Road race
After months of deliberations, the National Highways Authority of India has finally got a new chairman in retired IAS officer, R.P. Singh. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that the UPA’s much-vaunted highway development projects will get back on track. A rather piquant situation has now arisen over increasing toll on highways, which has pitted the ministry of road transport and highways against the Planning Commission.
According to sources, the commission is in favour of increasing highway toll rates by 10 per cent and levying higher rates for expressways. The proposal mooted by Gajendra Haldea, adviser to Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia, however, faces stiff resistance from the ministry babus. Curiously, while ministry officials, including special secretary and financial adviser Vijay Chibber, are opposing the proposal, their minister C.P. Joshi seems to be all for it. Apparently, this is not the first time that Mr Haldea and Mr Chibber have been at loggerheads. Who will win this time?
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