CALCULATED CHANGE

The Tamil Nadu chief minister is conscious of the fact that his performance in handling the Covid situation over the next few months could make or mar his term in office. Going by the change of the state’s chief secretary and the choice of four IAS officers for the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO), Stalin has signaled clearly how governance is likely to be steered in the next five years. He picked V. Irai Anbu to be chief secretary, overlooking the seniority of 12 IAS officers. Anbu is widely regarded as a fair administrator with a good track record in sprucing up the government machinery and is also among the few civil servants in the state who is popular as a public speaker, especially in the semi urban and rural areas.

Inducted into the CMO are T. Udhayachandran as the first secretary, along with P. Umanath, M.S. Shanmugam and Anu George, the three other secretaries. The CMO retains the organisational structure of earlier ones that the AIADMK used. In other changes, Gagandeep Singh Bedi, who was the popular district collector of Cuddalore during the 2004 tsunami, has been made the Greater Chennai Corporation commissioner. “His choices to lead the bureaucracy have been positive, identifying honest and efficient officers, some of whom had been cold-stored in the past 10 years,” says political analyst Sathiya Moorthy. “It is not about the choices alone, but the kind of message Stalin has sent down the line to the people.”