RAIPUR: The Chhattisgarh government on Thursday appointed a senior IAS officer of 1987-batch Rajendra Prasad Mandal as the new chief secretary (CS) of the state. Mandal will replace Sunil Kujur, a 1986-batch officer who retired on Thursday.
Stressing upon his administrative priority while talking to the Express he said, "It would be to ensure the state government’s welfare schemes get executed with transparency through a time-bound action plan, besides the focus on the rural economy, infrastructure development and generation of employment".
According to the highly placed sources in the state secretariat, there were three senior IAS officers in the race for the top bureaucratic post but Mandal emerged as best choice owing to his result-oriented performances and proficiency.
A couple of months back, the state government had written to the Centre seeking an extension for Kujur by another six months but it was not considered.
Mandal will be the third CS under the Congress regime led by the Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel in Chhattisgarh. Ajay Singh, a1983-batch IAS who was a chief secretary when the new Congress government was formed in December last year was replaced by Kujur in January this year.
Mandal did his schooling from Bilaspur district and graduated as a technocrat from the Raipur-based government engineer college. He was an additional chief secretary—panchayat, public works department, forest & environment among other departments.
Along with the appointment of the chief secretary, the state government also affected a major bureaucratic reshuffle on posting of eight other senior IAS officers.