Guv plays hardball on Saudagar

K Sreedhar Rao / TNN / Oct 10, 2005, 00:42 IST

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After much dilly-dallying, the govt has agreed to keep services of Anwar, who was secretary to governor Shinde.

HYDERABAD: L'Affaire Saudagar Anwar is becoming curiouser and curiouser. After much dilly-dallying, the government has agreed to keep the services of Anwar, who was secretary to governor Sushilkumar Shinde until retiring at the end of August. He will now get an extension of three months as officer on special duty (OSD).
But Shinde, at whose behest Anwar is being given an extension, is not satisfied. He wants Anwar given the rank of special chief secretary, the same status the IAS officer held at the time of retirement. This has put the administration on the horns of a dilemma.
They are unable to figure out how to offer the rank of special chief secretary to a retired person in what is called a 'cadre post' in official parlance. The rank of each post in the government and who shall hold them is predetermined as per an official manual.
By this, the secretary to the governor is a post that can be held by an IAS officer of the rank of special chief secretary/principal secretary. An OSD can function as the governor's secretary, but is not technically so.

When Anwar was on the verge of retirement, the government had offered the governor a panel of names from which to choose his new secretary. But Shinde wanted Anwar. This put the government in a delicate position. On the one hand it did not want to turn down a request from the first citizen.
On the other, it had no powers to extend the services of an IAS officer. It can be done only by the Union government__even then only in emergency circumstances. As a way out, the government thought Anwar could be offered a contract job as OSD.

But sources said Shinde was not agreeable because Anwar was reluctant to take up a contractual job when he had already secured a post-retirement sinecure as vice-chairman of the Andhra Pradesh Administrative Tribunal. When contacted, Anwar refused to discuss the subject, but he is still continuing at the Raj Bhavan in an unofficial capacity.
Although the reasons for Shinde's fascination for Anwar can't be figured out, sources said his advisers have shown him a precedent. When P V R K Prasad retired as special chief secretary, he was made director-general of the Marri Channa Reddy Institute of Human Resources Development (MCRHRD) with the same rank.
Rule-bound babus in the Secretariat, however, point out that that post was an 'ex cadre post'��where formal government rules didn't apply. So the incumbent could be given the rank of special chief secretary, but Raj Bhavan is a different case.

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