A sting video purportedly showing Mohammad Shahid, personal secretary to the Chief Minister, seeking money on behalf of CM from a liquor baron, is all set to land him and Chief Minister Harish Rawat in soup with the Centre having written to the State Government saying that it is ending Shahid's inter-cadre deputation to Uttarakhand with immediate effect. Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) had taken the decision on July 25. The video that triggered ripples across the state and prodded the Opposition BJP to demand resignation of CM, was made public at the BJP headquarters in New Delhi on 22 July. The Pioneer has copy of the DoPT letter, ending the inter-cadre deputation of the tainted IAS in its possession.
Issued by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions of the Government of India, the order dated July 25 was signed by Deputy Secretary to the Government of India, J Srinivasan.
A Gujarat cadre IAS officer of 1998 batch, Shahid has now been asked to report to the place of his immediate previous posting prior to his inter-cadre deputation.
Shahid had come on deputation to Uttarakhand a couple of months after Harish Rawat had taken over as Chief Minister of the state in February 2014.
He also served as personal secretary to Rawat when the latter was Union Minister for Water Resources in the then UPA Government.
The official had left the state government red-faced when the BJP circulated a sting video CD on July 22, purportedly showing him negotiating a bribery deal with a middleman for liquor baron.
To diffuse the snowballing crisis with rejuvenated BJP creating ruckus, CM had embarked on a damage control exercise, relieving the scam-tainted IAS from five important departments - PS to CM, Secretary Excise, Information, Samadhan portal and Corruption Eradication- on July 26. He asked the state's chief secretary to absolve him of the responsibilities, pending an ongoing inquiry into the authenticity of the sting video.
It would be pertinent to mention here that as the CD was made public by Union minister Niramala Sitharaman in Delhi on July 22. A few hours after things came to the fore, the PCC spokesperson issued a statement that PS to CM had been suspended by way of governmental action. However, CM dismissed the statement as false and insisted that he would not act on the CD until its authenticity was proved. He asked DGP BS Sidhu to conduct an inquiry to ascertain things for the State Government.