Gujarat Confidential: Deja Vu for IAS officer

FOLLOWING THE transfer of 26 senior IAS officers on Tuesday, the state government modified the transfer order of 1998 batch IAS officer Mohammad Shahid. Interestingly, this is the second time Shahid has been transferred within days of a reshuffle. In its ‘partial modification’ of its December 23 notification, the state government on Wednesday transferred Shahid from the Social Justice and Empowerment Department to Cottage and Rural Industries as Commissioner including the charge as Principal Secretary, Cottage and Rural Industries, Industries and Mines Department.

On Tuesday, Shahid was transferred from the Social Justice and Empowerment Department to the Tribal Development Department, relieving Shahmeena Husain of this additional charge. However, after Wednesday’s abrupt change, Husain will continue to hold additional charge of the post of Principal Secretary, Tribal Development Department, until further orders. In July 2018, a similar reshuffle of three IAS officers within a week of their transfers on July 12, 2018 had raised eyebrows. Sources close to this development had revealed it was the “side effect” of a critical detail that the government had reportedly “overlooked” in the case of 1998 batch IAS officer Mohammad Shahid, who was transferred on July 12 in 2018  with 20 other IAS officers, from commissioner of fisheries to vice chairman and chief executive officer of Gujarat Maritime Board, replacing Ajay Bhadoo.
Shahid was posted back to his original department as Principal Secretary, Agriculture, Farmers Welfare and Co-operation Department, an additional post he was holding. The reason for Shahid being posted back was his perceived proximity to former Congress Chief Minister of Uttarakhand Harish Rawat. After a few months of appointment of Harish Rawat as the CM in February 2014, Shahid was sent on an inter cadre deputation from Gujarat cadre to Uttarakhand for a period of two years in July 2014, when he served as private secretary to Rawat. Even before this appointment, he had also served as the Personal Secretary to Rawat when he was the Union Minister for Water Resources in the then UPA government. But, within a year, the Uttarakhand government was forced to relieve Shahid and send him back to the Centre from where he was later repatriated to his home state Gujarat in August 2015. What comes as a surprise is that the Gujarat government was not briefed about this case history back then in July 2018 and is again retracting its orders in a few days.