The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change has relieved the Special Secretary and two Additional Secretaries from their duties from the office of Union Environment Minister Bhupinder Yadav. This development comes as part of a series of orders issued on July 3 by Vibhuti Paniyar, Under Secretary, Government of India. The exact reason behind the development is still unknown.
All three members have been part of Yadav’s office for several years now.
The orders, seen by HT, say a note by the minister, Amar Singh, an IRS-IT officer of the 2010 batch, has been reverted to his original cadre, Revenue Department, on “administrative reasons” and has been relieved of his duties with immediate effect.
Singh was also PS to Yadav when the latter took over as Labor Minister from 2021 to 2024 and was reappointed as PS after Yadav took over as Environment Minister after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Additional PS, Shailesh Kumar Singh, from the Central Secretarial Service (CSS) has also been prematurely repatriated to his original cadre, Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), with an “extended cooling off period”.
The second additional PS, Ayush Saran, has been ‘terminated’ with immediate effect. “Shri Ayush Saran is relieved of his duties with immediate effect,” the office order said.
There was no immediate response regarding this development from the ministry or the minister’s office. The version will be updated when a response is received.
