Centre appoints 30 new joint secretaries in major bureaucratic reshuffle

As many as 30 joint secretaries (JSs) have been appointed in various central government departments as part of a major bureaucratic reshuffle effected Monday by the Centre.

IAS officers Piyush Goel and Nidhi Khare will be joint secretaries in the Home Ministry for five years, an order issued by the personnel ministry said.

Nidhi Mani Tripathi has been appointed JS in Department of Commerce, Anand Mohan Bajaj will be joint secretary of Department of Economic Affairs and Mandeep Bhandari has been named JS in Department of Health and Family Welfare.

IAS officer V Vidyavathi has been moved from Cabinet Secretariat to replace Gyanesh Bharti as joint secretary in ministry of environment, forest and climate change.

Bharti will now be joint secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat.

Senior IPS officer Sadanand Vasant Date has been appointed joint secretary in Department of Justice. He is at present inspector general (operations) in Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF).

M C Jauhari and Priyank Bharti have been appointed joint secretaries in NITI Aayog and Ministry of Road Transport and Highways respectively.

Bhabani Prasad Pati, a Gujarat-cadre Indian Forest Service officer, and Vismita Tej will be joint secretaries in Coal Ministry, the order said.

Abhilaksh Likhi and Atish Chandra have been named joint secretaries in Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare.

Paban K Borthakur, joint secretary, Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare, has been appointed chairman of Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) under Department of Commerce.

IAS officer Partha Sarthi Sensharma will be joint secretary, Department of Fertilizers. R K Khandelwal will be deputy director general, Department of Telecommunications and S Jagannathan has been appointed JS in Department of Food and Public Distribution.

Sukriti Likhi and Mandeep Bhandari will be joint secretaries in Department of Heavy Industry and Department of Health and Family Welfare respectively.

Rajiv Sharma has been appointed financial advisor of NATGRID for a tenure of five years, Neelam Sanghi will be additional central provident fund commissioner (Hqrs), Employees' Provident Fund Organisation under Ministry of Labour and Vijaylakshmi Bidari will be regional director of Staff Selection Commission in Bangalore.

V Shashank Shekhar, joint secretary, Department of School Education and Literacy, has been shifted to the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances in the same rank.

Ramchandra Meena, an Indian Revenue Service (Income Tax) officer, has been appointed JS, Department of School Education and Literacy, in place of Shekhar.

Ashish Srivastava will be joint secretary, Ministry of Woman and Child Development. He is at present resident commissioner, Madhya Pradesh Bhawan here.