Kapoor picked PMO adviser in reshuffle

KAPOOR WAS SECRETARY OF THE PETROLEUM AND NATURAL GAS MINISTRY TILL NOVEMBER 2021

NEW DELHI: The Centre has appointed former petroleum secretary Tarun Kapoor as an adviser to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, even as it transferred a few other IAS officers in a bureaucratic reshuffle announced on Monday.

According to an order issued by the personnel ministry, Kapoor will be inducted at the rank of secretary to the government of India. “The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved appointment of Kapoor, as adviser to the Prime Minister, in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), in the rank and scale of Secretary to Government of India, initially for a period of two years from the date of joining,” the order said.

Kapoor is an IAS officer of the 1987 Himachal Pradesh cadre and was a secretary of the petroleum and natural gas ministry till November 30, 2021.

The Centre also appointed senior bureaucrats Atish Chandra and Hari Ranjan Rao as additional secretaries in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). A 1994-batch IAS officer from the Bihar cadre, Chandra

was the chairman and director (CMD) at the Food Corporation of India (FCI). A 1994-batch IAS officer from the Madhya Pradesh cadre, Rao is currently the administrator at the Universal Services Obligation Fund in the Department of Telecommunications.

In the reshuffle, Pradip Kumar Tripathi was appointed as the secretary (coordination) at the Cabinet Secretariat. Neel Kamal Darbari was appointed as the chairperson of the National Authority Chemical Weapons Convention, and S Radha Chauhan as the secretary of the department of personnel and training. Devendra Kumar Singh has been picked as the secretary-general of the National Human Rights Commission, and Gyanesh Kumar has been appointed as the secretary of the ministry of cooperation.