In the past nine years, Jharkhand has had nine chief secretaries. The state appointed a 1976-batch IAS officer, Shiv Basant as its ninth chief secretary. Basant’s last posting was in the state finance corporation as its chairman. He succeeds AK Basu who has retired.The newly appointed chief secretary’s wife, Sunila Basant, also an IAS officer, is working an advisor of the Governor, K Sankaranarayanan.
Ever since Jharkhand was constituted as a state in November, 2000, transfers and postings of senior officials has become a common feature. The World Bank (WB) in its lengthy report on Jharkhand in June 2007, had made an adverse comment on the frequent transfers and postings in the state.
The WB report pointed out that the average tenure of a secretary in Jharkhand was a mere 15 months, deputy commissioners (district magistrate), 12 months. The report said that the premature transfers undermined the capacity to implement reform effectively as well as continuity in administration. The Centre has amended the IAS rules to prescribe minimum tenure for IAS officers. States will have to comply to them, the report added.
The report suggested that Jharkhand could address the issue by publicly tracking transfers of IAS officers to ensure compliance with a three-year norm, establishing statutory committees to shield the civil service from political interference in transfers and so on, ensure that the average tenure for the IAS cadre does not fall below three years through the creation of stability index and introduce counselling for positions in health and education.
