Hours after the Central government relaxed key rules to give a one-year extension to Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba beyond August 30, 2023, his extension was extended, as per a government order. With this extension, Rajiv Gauba now becomes the longest-serving cabinet secretary.
A government order said, “The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) has approved extension in service to Shri Rajiv Gauba as Cabinet Secretary for a further period of one year beyond 30.08.2023, in relaxation of AIS (DCRB) Rules, 1958 and Rule 56(d) of the Fundamental Rules.”
Before Rajiv Gauba, BD Pande had been the longestserving cabinet secretary from November 2, 1972, to March 31, 1977.
Rajiv Gauba, a 1982-batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the Jharkhand cadre and a former Union home secretary, assumed the country's top bureaucratic post in 2019, and his tenure was initially set for two years. Subsequently, he received extensions twice, first in 2021 and then in August of the following year.
The rules allow the Central government to give an extension in service to the cabinet secretary, in the public interest "provided that the total term of the cabinet secretary, who is granted such extensions of service, shall not exceed four years".
The latest extension will allow Rajiv Gauba to stay in the post during the general elections due early next year.
Rajiv Gauba is credited as the primary architect of the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019. This act led to the division of the erstwhile state into two union territories - Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, following the abrogation of the special status accorded to the region under Article 370 of the Constitution.
He had also served as secretary in the Union urban development ministry and additional secretary in the home ministry, looking after the crucial left-wing extremism division, among other responsibilities.
Born in Punjab, Gauba had graduated in Physics from the Patna University. He had served in Jharkhand as the chief secretary for 15 months before returning to serve in the central government in 2016.
(With agency inputs)
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