A faux pas by the Gujarat government makes an IAS officer have a feeling of déjà vu. It all began on Tuesday when the state govt ordered the transfer of 26 senior IAS officers, only to modify it the very next day. The transfer order of IAS officer Mohammad Shahid (IAS:1998:GJ), issued on Dec 23, was modified with a fresh transfer the very next day, on Dec 24.
The interesting part of this faux pas is that this is the second time Shahid has been transferred twice from the same department within days of a reshuffle.
On Dec 23, Shahid was transferred from the Social Justice and Empowerment Department to the Tribal Development Department, replacing Shahmeena Hussain (IAS:1997:GJ), who held the post in additional charge.
On Dec 24, Shahid was transferred from the Social Justice and Empowerment Department to Cottage and Rural Industries as Commissioner, including the charge as Principal Secretary, Cottage and Rural Industries, Industries and Mines Department.
So, now after this abrupt change, Hussain will continue to hold the additional charge of the post of Principal Secretary, Tribal Development Department, until further orders.
A similar incident had taken place in July 2018, when three IAS officers had been re-transferred within a week of their transfers on July 12, 2018.
Sources close to this development had revealed it was the “side effect” of a critical detail that the government had reportedly “overlooked” in Shahid’s case. He was transferred on July 12, 2018, along with 20 other IAS officers, from the post of Commissioner of Fisheries to Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Gujarat Maritime Board, replacing Ajay Bhadoo (IAS:1999:GJ). But he was posted back to his original department as Principal Secretary, Agriculture, Farmers Welfare and Co-operation Department, an additional post he was holding.
That time it was ascribed to his perceived proximity to former Congress Chief Minister of Uttarakhand Harish Rawat.
After a few months of Harish Rawat’s taking over as the CM in February 2014, Shahid was sent on an inter-cadre deputation from Gujarat to Uttarakhand, where he served as private secretary to CM Rawat. Even before this appointment, he had also served as the personal secretary to Rawat when he was the Union Minister for Water Resources in the then UPA government. Later Shahid was forcibly relieved from Uttarakhand and sent on central deputation only to be repatriated to his home cadre—Gujarat—in August 2015.
But the Gujarat government seems to have not been briefed properly about this case history.
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