BHUBANESWAR: A day after taking voluntary retirement, former IAS officer and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's private secretary VK Pandian was on Tuesday appointed as chairman 5T (transformational initiatives) and Nabin Odisha in the rank of cabinet minister.
Pandian will directly work under the chief minister, a notification issued by the general administration and public grievance department said.
However, speculation is rife in political circles here about the political role to be played by Pandian. While Opposition BJP and Congress maintained that the new appointment of Pandian is political with more power over the government and BJD, the ruling party said that it will further accelerate the pace of development in the State.
The move, though, seems to have disarmed the Opposition political parties as both the BJP and Congress are of the opinion that now Pandian can enter politics. His whirlwind district tours had evoked strong political reactions with the two parties demanding that he resign from the IAS and join politics.
State BJP president Manmohan Samal told media persons that there is no objection to Pandian now entering politics. "There is nothing wrong for a retired IAS officer to enter politics and there are many such persons in BJP also," he said and added that the BJP had opposed the system, not the person “Now he can enter politics,” he added.
Leader of the Congress Legislature Party Narasingh Mishra said the appointment of Pandian as chairman of 5T and Nabin Odisha is not illegal and unconstitutional. But the decision should have been taken by the cabinet, he said and added that the chief minister can always take any decision.
However, OPCC president Sarat Pattanayak alleged that the haste in which Pandian’s voluntary retirement proposal was accepted in three days by the Centre has again exposed the tacit understanding between BJD and BJP.
Former finance minister and senior BJD leader Shashi Bhusan Behera welcomed the new appointment of Pandian and said it will further accelerate the development of the state.
On Monday, in a move that came as no surprise, Pandian had taken voluntary retirement from government service.
The Department of Personnel and Training, Government of India, had approved his request for a Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS), waiving the notice period as recommended by the state
government. The request for VRS and approval for the same by the Centre happened in three days.
Pandian, who also served as 5T Secretary to the State Government, had taken centre stage in the Naveen Patnaik government with not only the bureaucracy but also the entire BJD looking up to him as the representative of the chief minister.
After BJD returned to power and Naveen Patnaik became the chief minister for the fifth time in 2019, Pandian was given the additional responsibility of implementing major transformational initiatives in government departments. He was appointed as the 5T Initiatives secretary in 2019.
After he took over the as the 5T secretary, all the mega projects such as Sri Jagannath Heritage Corridor, temple redevelopments across the state, school and college transformation programmes, health sector initiatives, rural and urban transformation etc have been his brainchild and conducted under his direct supervision.
The 2000-batch IAS officer of the Odisha cadre began his bureaucratic career as the sub-collector of Dharmagarh in Kalahandi district in 2002. He was appointed the collector of Mayurbhanj district in 2005, and then in 2007, he was made the collector of Ganjam. Pandian joined the Chief Minister's Office (CMO) in 2011, and since then, he served as the private secretary to the chief minister till he took VRS.