Dalit officials are smiling on Mayawati’s merry-go-round

But the CM is batting slow if you look at her record of shifting officials during her previous tenures. In 1997, she had shifted 100 officials within four days. During her six-month stint, she shifted 1419 officials, including 467 of the IAS and IPS cadre; the figure was 480 in her five-month stint in 1995.

‘‘She is going on expected lines,’’ says state Samajwadi Party chief Ram Sharan Das. ‘‘No one had any doubt that Mayawati’s transfer industry would start working overtime once she had settled down. A number of officials being elevated to plum posts in the latest reshuffle have a controversial past. The rehabilitation of those belonging to a particular caste (read SC) has also made it clear that the Dalit agenda is being

implemented once again.’’

Dharmendra Dev, against whom an inquiry is pending, has been made CEO of NOIDA while Om Prakash will be the new CEO of Greater NOIDA.

Interestingly, Prakash had been unceremoniously shifted from Gorakhpur by Mayawati herself during her last enure.

The beneficiary of the Dalit agenda are P.L.Punia, principal secretary to the Chief Minister, Sri Krishan, secretary to the Chief Minister, Ram Kumar, secretary, minor irrigation and rural engineering, Rajendra Bhaunwal, secretary, appointments, and Raja Ram, Commissioner, Kanpur divison.

‘‘I am not hell-bent on shifting officials but the corrupt and inactive should realise that I am not going to spare them,’’ Mayawati had warned during her first press conference.

All the transfers, sources said, have been carried out without informing the Bharatiya Janata Party leaders and before a coordination committee or a common minimum programme could assume shape.