Tamil Nadu is all set to get a new Chief Secretary and Director General of Police as the incumbents of both these posts are due to retire soon.
According to a report in The Hindu, Tamil Nadu Governor Banwarilal Purohit has cleared the names of K Shanmugam IAS and JK Tripathy IPS for the top posts in the state.
The appointment orders for the same would be issued on Saturday, according to the report. K Shanmugam will succeed Girija Vaidyanathan in office while JK Tripathy will succeed TK Rajendran.
Both these officers belong to the 1985 batch of the civil services. Currently the Finance Secretary of Tamil Nadu, K Shanmugam’s name was preferred by the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu Edappadi K Palaniswami over R Rajagopal (Secretary to Tamil Nadu Governor) and Rajeev Ranjan (Special Secretary of GST), who are in fact senior to K Shanmugam. He is expected to hold office till his superannuation in July 2020.
JK Tripathy, currently the Chairman of the Tamil Nadu Uniformed Services Recruitment Board, was also the Chennai City Police Commissioner before. He will hold the office till 2021, since the post of DGP is of a fixed tenure of two years. JK Tripathy was the senior most in the list of probables considered by the selection committee comprised of members from Union Public Service Commission and from the state and central governments, besides the Chief Minister himself.
The two officers will take charge on Sunday as the tenures of Girija Vaidyanathan and TK Rajendran come to an end.
Speculations were rife since the last few weeks that the names in contention for the top administrative post in the state government include present Home Secretary Niranjan Mardi, Commercial Taxes Secretary TV Somanathan and Rural Development Secretary Hansraj Verma.
Girija Vaidyanathan had taken charge in December 2016 soon after the Income Tax department conducted searches at the house and official premises of the then Chief Secretary P Rama Mohan Rao.