Naved Masood, secretary in the ministry of corporate affairs, or Javed Usmani, Uttar Pradesh's chief secretary, could replace Ajit K Seth after he retires as Cabinet Secretary in June.
Although a new prime minister is yet to be sworn in, airtime in the Capital was clogged with excited chatter about whom the new government could favour. Masood is from the Manipur-Tripura cadre. Usmani has not been rubbing along well with UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and will grasp at any chance of coming to the Centre.
Old-timers recalled the previous time the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government came to power in 1998, it had to appoint a new Cabinet Secretary in a matter of days. At that time, Prabhat Kumar replaced T S R Subramaniam, then on an extension.
If the seniority principle is applied, Sutanu Behuria, secretary in the heavy industries department, should be next Cabinet Secretary. Behuria, originally hailing from Odisha, retires on July 31. According to rules, an officer needs to be below 60 years of age at the time of appointment, and once appointed as cabinet secretary, gets a two-year term. The only other 1976 batch IAS still in service is Bihar's chief secretary, Alok K Sinha.