Sameer Sinha appointed chief wildlife warden of Uttarakhand

DEHRADUN: In a late-night development on Tuesday, 37 forest officers were transferred in Uttarakhand. As part of the reshuffle, Sameer Sinha was given the additional charge of principal chief conservator of forests (wildlife) and appointed as permanent chief wildlife warden.


In another major posting, Dheeraj Pandey was made the director of Corbett Tiger Reserve and Dhananjai Mohan the managing director of the forest corporation. Besides, KM Rao was appointed as the additional principal chief conservator of forests (environment).

Also, GS Pandey was made the new CEO of CAMPA along with planning and finance. Among other postings, Nishant Verma was made the director of Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve while Man Singh was given the charge of South Kumaon.

Meanwhile, Mayank Shekhar Jha has been appointed as the DFO of Haridwar, Ashutosh Singh as Mussoorie DFO and CS Joshi as Nainital DFO.

However, a section of IFS officers were not happy with the new postings. "Three officers of Chief Conservator Forest (CCF) rank have been posted to the cadre post of Conservator Forests (CF) rank, which should be handled by someone junior to CF rank, not CCF.

Also, a majority of the women IFS officers have been removed from the field post of DFOs despite them being more active on the field,” said a senior IFS officer.

In fact, former HoFF of Uttarakhand, ID Pande, regional president of the Society of Retired Forest Officers of Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh has escalated the matter of transfer of Dr Abhilasha before the HoFF tagging her attachment to head office as 'extremely demeaning' and sad.

She is known for her devotion and sincerity, in the recent tiger poachers' nabbing case she played an instrumental role. Currently, Uttarakhand has just one lady IFS appointed for a field job as DFO.

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