‘Vested interests win,’ says senior bureaucrat Ashok Khemka after 51st transfer
The Haryana government transferred him, along with 12 other IAS officers, a month after he asked a minister to return a vehicle to a junior officer.
Senior bureaucrat Ashok Khemka on Sunday took to Twitter to express his disappointment after he was transferred yet again. In what is believed to be his 51st move, the Haryana government transferred him along with 12 other Indian Administrative Service officers.
“So Much Work Planned. News Of Another Transfer. Crash Landing Again. Vested Interests Win. Déjà Vu. But This Is Temporary,” Khemka tweeted.
Khemka, who was the principal secretary in the Social Justice and Empowerment Department, has been posted as the principal secretary in the Sports and Youth Affairs Department. His transfer this time came just a month after he asked Haryana Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment Krishan Bedi to return a vehicle that belonged to a junior officer, The Indian Express reported.
“It is fine if it has been done in public interest but saddening if it is done for vested interests,” he told ANI on Monday. “I feel as though a crash landing has happened, but I will overcome this and work in the new department with full energy.”
The 1991-batch IAS officer first made news in 2012, when he cancelled a land deal involving Congress President Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra’s firm and real estate giant DLF. The Congress-ruled government in Haryana had filed a chargesheet against Khemka for “wrongly” cancelling the deal, but the Bharatiya Janata Party government dropped the chargesheet when it came to power in the state in 2014.