Eager to attend the high- profile wedding of Chief Minister Harish Rawat’s youngest daughter, which is all set to be solemnised in Haldwani on April 29, the State bureaucrats are opting for field tours so as to reach there as part of official tours. Consequently, the Secretariat that usually looks choc-a-bloc with vehicles and officers wore a deserted look on Tuesday. Interestingly, the CM has not invited any of the bureaucrats officially. Around 39,000 cards, written on the CM’s official letter-heads, have been distributed among the people, especially the gram pradhan and the gram sabha members. But none of the bureaucrats figured in it.
When this correspondent visited the Secretariat on Tuesday, he found a host of senior bureaucrats, including principal secretary Ranveer Singh, secretaries Bhaskaranand and GS Jangpangi, were conspicuous by their absence. The officials who were present were found engrossed in gossip over the babus making a beeline to Haldwani to show up at the wedding.
“They are unlikely to miss the opportunity to humour the CM into giving them plum postings on the platters,” one of them quipped. Even the ruling party politicians, who are now covetously eyeing the lucrative ‘datiyats’, yet be distributed, have already pitched their camps there. “This is to nudge the CM to go their intended ways,” the official added.
The Pioneer found that the principal secretary is presently on official tour in Pauri and Udham Singh Nagar. He would show up at the wedding at the right time, another official muttered. Some were heard requesting their peers, out to make it to Haldwani, to take them there in their vehicles. “The babus are a crafty lot. They are opting for such official tours to make sure that their attendance does not burn holes in their pockets while ensuring that they can make full use of the wedding-attendance to have their heart’s craving for plum posting fulfilled,” whispered an official.