 "Finance Secretary, Ratan P Watal along with Shaktikanta Das, Secretary (DEA) holding a press conference in New Delhi. The Director General (M&C), Press Information Bureau, A P Frank Noronha is also seen")
With Finance Secretary Ratan Watal's extended tenure ending on April 30, Financial Services Secretary Anjuly Chib Duggal will become the Expenditure Secretary and Ajay Narayan Jha, a special secretary in the expenditure department, will be the new top bureaucrat in the Department of Financial Services, Business Standard has learnt.
Economic Affairs Secretary Shaktikanta Das, the seniormost in the finance ministry after Watal, is expected to take over as finance secretary. According to practice, the seniormost official among the five secretaries heading economic affairs, expenditure, revenue, financial services and disinvestment is appointed as finance secretary. Das is a 1980 batch Tamil Nadu-cadre officer.
Watal, a 1978 batch Andhra Pradesh-cadre Indian Administrative Service officer, had been the expenditure secretary since December 2013 and became the finance secretary in August 2015 when his predecessor in the latter post, Rajiv Mehrishi, became home secretary. Watal was due to retire on February 29, but as the government was in the middle of Budget making for 2016-17, his tenure was extended by two months.
According to government sources, Watal's tenure is unlikely to be extended any further.
Watal is known as a model bureaucrat whose work is highly regarded in the Narendra Modi government. He and Das have reportedly made a push for Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to maintain a tough fiscal deficit target of 3.5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) for 2016-17, in spite of a massive expenditure burden due to One Rank One Pension and Seventh Pay Commission recommendations.
According to reports, he was also rushed by the Centre to meet with the current Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti after her father Mohammed Mufti Sayeed passed away in January as the government tried to save its tenuous alliance with the Peoples Democratic Party in the state. The events show the trust the political leadership has placed in him.
Duggal is a 1981 batch Punjab-cadre officer who has had a six-year stint in the expenditure department as joint secretary and additional secretary. She has also worked in commerce and corporate affairs ministries and was appointed the financial services secretary in August last year.
Sources say Duggal's previous stint in the expenditure department makes her a natural candidate and she will be able to hit the ground running at a time when Finance Bill 2016 is yet to be passed. The second part of the Budget session of Parliament is from April 25.
Duggal's likely successor in the Department of Financial Services will be Ajay Narayan Jha, a 1982-batch Manipur-cadre officer. Jha is currently the special secretary (secretary equivalent) in the expenditure department and heads the committee, which is working on the modalities of removing Plan and non-Plan expenditure distinctions from Budget 2017-18 onwards. He was also the secretary to the Fourteenth Finance Commission.
The other two top bureaucrats in the finance ministry are Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia and Disinvestment Secretary Neeraj Kumar Gupta.
