In a major policy change pertaining to appointments in Central Government, the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) on Monday decided to rationalise the process for appointments of Class I officers at the Centre. This comes after members of civil services belonging to cadres like Indian Railways Accounts Services (IRAS) and Indian Defence Accounts Services (IDAS) etc among others demanded the same career growth like promotions, pay scale, etc, as being enjoyed by the IAS officers.

The gap between the IAS and other services in appointments to certain posts was reduced in the appointments of 22 officers, 13 of whom from different services were made Joint Secretaries (JS) along with nine IAS officers in various Central Government departments. The issue was also brought to the notice of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who encouraged that officers of different cadres should also be treated at par with IAS and that their promotions should be done accordingly. 

K Vinayak Rao, an officer of Indian Railway Accounts Service, has been appointed Member (Finance) in Delhi Development Authority (DDA). Madhu Ranjan Kumar and Pramod Kumar Pathak have been appointed as JS in Department of Higher Education and Ministry of Ayush respectively.

Kamlesh Chaturvedi and P K Borthakur will be Joint Secretaries in Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, and Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare. K Rajaraman has been named JS, Department of Expenditure, Shantmanu as Development Commissioner in Ministry of Textiles and Pramod Kumar Tiwari will be JS in Department of Food and P Public Distribution, the order issued by DoPT said.

Meera Ranjan Tshering, an officer of Indian Postal Service, will be Joint Secretary and Financial Advisor, Ministry of Women and Child Development. Sarita Mittal, an officer of Central Secretariat Service, will be Joint Secretary, Department of Health Research.

While Gujarat cadre 1989 IAS Srinivas Ramaswamy Katikithala has been appointed as Joint Secretary in Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), senior bureaucrat Anil Srivastava, who is at present Joint Secretary in Ministry of Civil Aviation, will be Advisor, Niti Aayog. Srivastava, a 1985 batch IAS officer of Madhya Pradesh cadre, will hold the post up to February 14, 2019, it said.

Upma Srivastava has been appointed new JS in Civil Aviation Ministry, in Anil Srivastava’s place and Nidhi Chhibber will be Joint Secretary in Defence Ministry. Jatindra Nath Swain has been appointed JS, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy.

While Alok Saxena will be JS, Department of Health and family Welfare, D K Sekar has been appointed Additional Director General of Foreign Trade (Chennai) and Chhavi Jha will be Joint Secretary, National Commission for Women. Jha has been appointed in place of Vandana Gupta, who has been sent back to her cadre — Indian Post and Telecommunication Accounts and Finance Service — before completion of her tenure.

Aastha Saxena Khatwani will be JS, Ministry of Women and Child Development, Murugan Arumugam Inbarasu has been named Joint Secretary, Department of Atomic Energy (Mumbai) and Shishir Sinha will be Deputy Director General, UIDAI.