Kashish Mittal, an IAS officer posted in Niti Aayog, has quit from the service over differences with the government on his transfer, ThePrint reported. He was posted as additional principal secretary to NITI Aayog vice-chairman Rajiv Kumar. According to the report, Mittal, an AGMUT-cadre officer, was transferred to Arunachal Pradesh.
However, he wasn’t happy with the decision and thought that it was unfair. The report suggests that Mittal did not have any issue with the Centre but he wanted to stay in NITI Aayog.
Mittal is the latest to join the league of those who quit the most coveted job in the country. Within one month, two IAS officers — Kannan Gopinathan and S Sasikanth Senthil — resigned from the service over ‘denial of freedom of expression’ and ‘democracy’.
Last month, Gopinathan resigned from the service over the restrictions imposed in Jammu and Kashmir following the abrogation of Article 370. He said that scrapping special status was the right of the elected government but people also have the right to respond too.
This week, another IAS officer S Sasikanth Senthil put down his papers saying he was disturbed about the manner in which the democracy was allegedly being compromised. In his resignation letter, Karnataka-cadre IAS officer Senthil said that it was unethical for him to continue as a civil servant in the government when “the fundamental building blocks of our diverse democracy are being compromised in an unprecedented manner.”
The officer predicted that the coming days would present extremely difficult challenges to the basic fabric of the country. “I would be better off outside the IAS to continue with my work at making life better for all. It simply cannot be business as usual anymore,” he said. Senthil, however, did not state what prompted him to quit from IAS.
Jammu and Kashmir is under complete lockdown following the abrogation of Article 370. To avoid any backlash, the authorities put regional leaders including three chief ministers — Mehbooba Mufti, Farooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah— under house arrest, snapped internet services and restricted communication lines. The government maintains that all these measures were taken to avoid any threat from external sources.