Decks clear for chief secy Delhi move

Sanjay Mitra

TT, Dec. 5: Bengal home secretary Basudeb Banerjee will take charge as chief secretary from January 1 replacing Sanjay Mitra whose transfer to Delhi has been cleared, sources close to chief minister Mamata Banerjee said this evening.

No official order has been issued but several bureaucrats confirmed the information had come "from the top".

Earlier, news had arrived that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had cleared the decks for Mitra's empanelment as a secretary to the central government.

This means Mitra, 56, the first Bengal chief secretary to vacate his post, will be considered for the post of secretary or an equivalent rank at the Centre.

Mitra had come to Bengal in July 2011 after seven years in the Prime Minister's Office, and was state health secretary before replacing Samar Ghosh as chief secretary in September 2012.

Had he stayed on till his retirement in May 2019, he would have broken N. Krishnamurti's record five-and-a-half-year-plus stint as head of Bengal's bureaucracy.

Officials close to Mitra said he had been seeking a shift to Delhi on health grounds for some time. Mitra had fallen ill at Mamata's Vijaya meeting for industrialists last month and was admitted to SSKM. He had appeared "helpless", colleagues said, as his family lives in Delhi.

A move to Delhi could help Mitra's career too, an official suggested. He said Mitra had, at least on paper, the chance to become cabinet secretary - head of the country's bureaucracy - although it's the Centre's decision.

"Of course, the transfer wouldn't have been possible without the state government's approval," he said.

When the 1982-batch empanelment took place earlier this year, Mitra was not considered and only Hem Pande was picked from the Bengal cadre.

"The chief minister's role in ensuring Mitra's empanelment was surprising," a bureaucrat said, mentioning how Mamata had earlier prevented officials from going on central deputation citing a manpower shortage.

She had then ignored advice that a larger presence of Bengal-cadre officers in Delhi - whose number had dwindled to a fourth of the optimum 60-odd - could help bring more central funds.

"Maybe she now wants to change the set-up before next year's polls," an official speculated.

Mamata and Mitra have had "differences of opinion", notably in the matter of removing officials under Election Commission orders during last year's general election, sources said.

There's speculation on who might replace Banerjee, 58, a 1983-batch IAS officer, as home secretary. Sources said the scales might tilt towards health secretary Malay De (1985 batch) although transport secretary Alapan Bandyopadhyay (1987 batch) is also being mentioned.