With the impending retirement of Haryana Chief Secretary Sanjeev Kaushal (IAS:1986:HY) in July, the state government is likely to consider appointing the next senior-most IAS officer, TVSN Prasad (IAS:1988:HY), to assume the top bureaucratic post, should Kaushal not receive an extension. Traditionally, the next senior-most IAS officer is appointed as the Chief Secretary following the retirement of the incumbent. However, this appointment would be for a short period, as Additional Chief Secretary TVSN Prasad is scheduled to retire in October.
Given this scenario, three officers from the 1990 IAS batch are reportedly seeking a revision in the cadre’s seniority list, according to confirmed sources. The officers—Ankur Gupta, Raja Sekhar Vundru, and Anurag Rastogi—have written to the state government, asserting that they originally belonged to the Haryana cadre, while two officers ahead of them, Sudhir Rajpal and Sumita Misra, were transferred from Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, respectively.
Citing the Indian Administrative Service (Regulation of Seniority) rules, the three officers argue that if an officer is transferred from one cadre to another at their request, they should be assigned a position in the gradation list below all officers of the same category with the same year of allotment.
As per Haryana’s IAS list on the official website of the chief secretary, Rajpal currently holds the top position among the state’s 1990 batch officers, having been transferred from Himachal Pradesh in 1994. While there is no explicit indication of a cadre change for Misra on the website, the three officers claim that she originally belonged to the Jammu and Kashmir cadre.
Confirmed sources indicate that the chief secretary’s office has received the representation, but the government is yet to conduct an examination of its contents. It’s crucial to note that the determination of seniority for IAS officers is not within the purview of the Haryana government but falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) at the Centre. Following the examination, the government is expected to forward the representation to the Centre for further consideration.
The next officer in line, Vivek Joshi (IAS:1989:HY), currently on central deputation as the Secretary of the Union Ministry of Finance, is expected to be appointed as Haryana’s Chief Secretary if he chooses to return to the state. However, if he remains on deputation, the subsequent officer in line will assume the role. In the event of his return, Joshi would hold the position until May 31, 2026. Following Joshi, there are six IAS officers from the 1990 batch in the state, with Rajpal leading the gradation list, followed by Sumita Mishra, Ankur Gupta, Anurag Rastogi, Anand Mohan Sharan, and Raja Shekhar Vundru.
