KOLKATA: Manoj Kumar Agarwal, West Bengal’s chief electoral officer, who received praise for holding largely violence-free assembly elections and criticism of mass disenfranchisement during the special intensive review under his watch, was appointed chief secretary of the eastern state on Monday.
The development came on the day Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari allocated portfolios among the five ministers who took oath with him at Brigade Parade in Kolkata on Saturday.
Agarwal, a 1990-batch IAS officer of the West Bengal cadre, is the second assembly election-related officer to be appointed by the new government headed by Adhikari. The administration on Saturday appointed Subrata Gupta, who was a special observer appointed by the Election Commission, as advisor to the chief minister, hours after the new BJP government was sworn in in the state.
“The Governor is pleased to appoint Shri Manoj Kumar Agarwal, IAS (WB: 1990), Chief Electoral Officer, West Bengal and ex officio Additional Secretary, Home Affairs and Hills (Elections) Department… as Principal Secretary, Government of West Bengal until further order(s),” a notification issued by the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms said, according to news agency ANI.
Agarwal replaced Dushyant Nariyala, a 1993 batch IAS officer who was appointed by the Election Commission on March 15 in the run-up to the elections. Nariwala will be the new Resident Commissioner of Bengal in Delhi. Nariyala replaced Nariyala Nandini Chakravorty, who was handpicked by then Prime Minister Mamata Banerjee on December 31, 2025. She was Bengal’s first female chief secretary.
Agarwal — who took charge immediately and sat next to Adhikari during his first meeting with IAS officers on Monday — did not speak to the media.
The Chief Secretary is the highest-ranking bureaucrat in the state government and is charged with coordinating with various departments.
The BJP came to power for the first time in the state after suffering a crushing defeat to the Trinamool Congress in the Assembly elections in April. The saffron party won 207 seats in the 294-member assembly, reducing the number of TMC seats to 80 seats.
Who is Manoj Kumar Agarwal?
It is rare for a state chief executive to hold the post of chief secretary, although it is not unheard of in India. In 2018, Vijay Kumar Dev, who was then the chief executive of Delhi, took over as chief secretary of the capital, where services are handled by the lieutenant governor who reports to the Union home ministry.
Born in July 1966, Agarwal earned a degree in engineering before becoming a bureaucrat. As CEO, he was also ex-officio Additional Chief Secretary of the Home and Hills Department which was headed by Banerjee. Earlier he served in various departments as Principal Secretary and Commissioner.
Agarwal, who was appointed Bengal CEO on August 12, 2025, oversaw the SIR where 9.1 million names in total were deleted, including 2.71 million names flagged under the controversial logical inconsistency category.
Read also: Bengal government to take decision on DA and 7th Pay Commission in next Cabinet meeting: CM Suvendu Adhikari
He then helped hold the two-stage assembly elections that saw an unprecedented deployment of central forces and only sporadic clashes, a rarity in the politically violent country.
Trinamool criticizes the appointment
The Transitional Military Council criticized the appointment.
“The so-called ‘neutral arbiter’ has been rewarded with the post of chief bureaucrat in the @BJP4India administration in Bengal. Is there still anyone who seriously believes that the 2026 Bengal elections were free and fair? TMC MP Sagarika Ghose said on Channel X.
The five BJP ministers also received their portfolios.
Agnimitra Paul, the first woman to be appointed to the Cabinet, will head the Department of Municipal Affairs and Urban Development, which was previously run by Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim.
Paul will also be in charge of the Women and Child Development and Social Welfare Department which was previously under Shashi Banga.
Former Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh, during whose tenure the BJP set a record by winning 18 of the state’s 42 Lok Sabha seats in 2019, has been appointed in-charge of the rural development and animal husbandry departments. These were previously under TMC’s Pradip Majumdar and Swapan Debnath respectively. They both lost the ballot box.
Nisith Pramanik, the former Union Minister of State for Home Affairs who won the Assembly elections, has been given charge of the North Bengal Development Department as well as the Sports and Youth Affairs Department. These divisions were under the command of Udayan Guha and Arup Biswas respectively. Both were defeated.
Matua community leader Ashok Kirtania became Minister of Food Department. The portfolio was earlier owned by TMC’s Rathin Ghosh who won the Madhyamgram seat.
Tribal community leader Kshwaram Tudu has been appointed as the new Minister for Backward Classes Welfare of Bengal, a portfolio previously held by Polo Chik Barak, who was defeated. Tudu has also been given charge of minority affairs and school education department which was previously under Mamata Banerjee.
Adhikari has retained all other departments for the time being.
