Vacate Secretariat, CS Rajiv Sharma directs officials to move to Hyderabad

Hyderabad: Barely 24 hours after Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao met Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan seeking allotment of AP Secretariat blocks to TS, Chief Secretary Rajiv Sharma on Monday held a high-level meeting and directed all secretaries to move their departments to new buildings in the city.

The Chief Secretary gave a 10 day-deadline for the move. Sources said that the Chief Secretary has appointed a committee with senior IAS officers to monitor the shifting of Secretariat departments.

The committee comprises IAS officers Adar Sinha, M.G. Gopal, Ashok Kumar, Vikas Raj, B.R. Meena, R. Sunil Sharma, Rajeswar Tiwari and Salini Misra.

According to sources, the Chief Secretary directed the Secretariat departments to move into offices of the Heads of Department (HoDs) concerned.

For example, the irrigation department will move into the office of the Engineer in Chief of Irrigation at Errumanzil, agriculture department will move in with the Commissioner of Agriculture and energy department will move into Vidyut Soudha.

Departments like general administration and finance which did not have HoDs in the city will move into Burgula Ramakrishna Rao Bhavan.

Sources said that the TS government is taking steps to vacate the Secretariat departments quickly to exert pressure on the AP government to vacate the Secretariat blocks and hand them over.

AP government is likely to take a positive decision on handing over of Secretariat buildings to Telangana government.

Sources said that the Telangana government is planning to locate the ministers’ chambers at Greenlands Guesthouse or at Manjeera Guesthouse.

It also plans to lay the foundation stone for the construction of new Secretariat buildings next month. After vacating the Secretariat departments, the state government will take up demolition of Secretariat buildings.

Mumbai-based Hafeez Contractor will submit the designs for new Secretariat buildings by the first week of next month.