Anil Chandra Puneth appointed Chief Secretary of AP

Anil Chandra Punetha, an Indian Administrative Service officer of 1984 batch, has been appointed as the new Chief Secretary of Andhra Pradesh.

He succeeds 1983 batch officer Dinesh Kumar, who is retiring from service Sunday on attaining the age of superannuation.

Punetha would hold the CS post for exactly eight months as he will retire on May 31, 2019.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who returned from a week-long trip to the US Saturday, chose Punetha as the head of the state bureaucracy overlooking two 1983 batch IAS officers who have tenure till April 2020.

The soft-spoken Punetha is now the Chief Commissioner of Land Administration and had previously held important posts like Principal Secretary (Revenue), Health and Family Welfare Commissioner and Agriculture Commissioner.

During his stint as Srikakulam district Collector in the 1990s, he won the Best Collector award for three consecutive years, which is said to be a unique record.

Meanwhile, government sources indicated that a major reshuffle of the bureaucrats in the state is on the anvil.

The exercise is expected to be taken up early next month.