AAP protests Khemka's transfer

AAP volunteers here on Sunday protested senior IAS officer Ashok Khemka's abrupt transfer by the Haryana government and burnt an effigy of Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar.

The volunteers, who gathered at Rao Mahavir Singh Chowk, also shouted slogans against the state government and Khattar.

The Aam Aadmi Party alleged that the BJP, when it was not in power in Haryana and at the Centre, criticised the then Congress government for transferring Khemka repeatedly.

"We demand cancellation of Khemka's transfer order and want to see him again in the transport department. Haryana has once again done injustice to the honest officer," a protestor told IANS.

In a late April 1 night reshuffle, the Haryana government shifted Khemka to a low-key assignment as director general, archeology and museums department.

Khemka, an IIT-Kharagpur graduate, was appointed as transport commissioner and secretary, transport department, in November last year after Khattar assumed office as chief minister of the first BJP government in the state.

At that time also, Khemka, who had blown the lid off the controversial multi-million-rupee land deals of Congress president Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra, was tipped to get an important assignment.

However, he was posted in the transport department.

It was Khemka's 46th transfer in 24 years.