Shinde appoints Bhushan Gagrani as additional chief secretary in CMO

Mumbai: He may still not have a Cabinet of ministers but chief minister Eknath Shinde has finally begun putting his CMO in place

Mumbai: He may still not have a Cabinet of ministers but chief minister Eknath Shinde has finally begun putting his CMO in place. On Wednesday, he appointed seasoned bureaucrat Bhushan Gagrani as additional chief secretary in the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO).

Archaeology Director R Hegde, MTDC MD Bhushan Gagrani and BCCI Renu Basu on the restoration of Mumbai's 4 forts and 2 bandstands Ht photo

Gagrani is 1990 batch IAS who was last in the CMO when Devendra Fadnavis was the chief minister. Before his appointment as additional chief secretary in the CMO, Gagrani was in the urban development department where also Eknath Shinde was his boss.

Shinde had so far continued with the staff that his predecessor Uddhav Thackeray had appointed in the CMO. He has also not shifted to the CM’s official residence, Varsha, choosing instead to stay at Nandanvan, the bungalow he was allotted as a minister in the previous Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi government.

His close aides say Shinde was waiting for the Supreme Court’s hearing on a clutch of petitions filed by both the factions of Shiv Sena before making the move. On Wednesday, a three-member bench headed by chief justice N V Ramana observed that the issues arising in the petitions filed in relation to the rift in Shiv Sena may have to be referred to the larger bench, which means the verdict in the case will likely take quite some time.

“The chief minister is in no hurry and wants to settle down into his new role before moving to Varsha,” one of Shinde’s close aides said. Though most new CM’s want the official residence to be refurbished before they move in, in Shinde’s case the delay could also be that he wants the Supreme Court to settle the matter before he moves into his new home.

The one change that the new CM did undertake was to ask all the officers attached to the offices of ministers to join back their parent departments with immediate effect. While the appointments made on a contractual basis were cancelled, a few officers and clerical staff at the CMO were directed to continue temporarily until fresh appointments are made.

“The staff approved for the CMO is around 140 people but for the last two weeks, the chief minister has been working with 15-20 people as the new appointments are likely to made later week,” a senior official said.

At present, senior bureaucrats Ashish Kumar Singh and Vikas Kharge are still working as additional chief secretary and principal secretary respectively at the CMO. Both were appointed by Thackeray and are unlikely to get a space in Shinde’s new team, said people appraised of the matter.