Promoted in January but still no posting – Ashok Khemka IAS goes public with his complaint

March 30, 2016, NewsCrunch

Ashok Khemka IAS, who was promoted as principal secretary by the BJP government in Haryana in January is still waiting for his posting.

He tweeted on Wednesday that he had been waiting for his new posting for the last three months.

“Holding a lower rank post is humiliating. Like a Lt General forced to hold post of Brigadier,” he said.  

Khemka currently heads the low-profile Archaeological department as its Director General. When he was abruptly shifted to his present post from Transport department in 2015 he had termed it as a demotion.

Khemka had then pointed out that the rank of Director General or Secretary is given to IAS officers with 16 years of experience, while he had already completed 24 years in service.

An upright officer Khemka has been transferred 45 times in his career as all governments irrespective of the parties have found him inconvenient to work with.

He  was particularly targeted by the Congress government led by Bhupinder Hooda after he cancelled a controversial land deal involving Congress president Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra and real estate giant DLF.

The Hooda government set up its own inquiry and then charge-sheeted Khemka for "causing damage to Mr Vadra's reputation" and "illegally" cancelling the deal.

In November, the BJP-led government dropped the charge-sheet for "professional misconduct" filed against him.

It also promoted Khemka in January with six other officers, but failed to follow it up with a posting.