In an audacious first act, West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari has overhauled the Chief Minister’s Office bureaucracy at the state secretariat, mere hours after swearing in. This bold restructuring severs ties with the Mamata Banerjee era, installing a new administrative guard.
The purge affects 16 holdovers from the old CMO, with 2014 IAS batcher Shantanu Mukhopadhyay—Banerjee’s trusted aide—leading the pack of transfers. Such moves signal unyielding intent to refresh the power structure.
Union heavyweight Pratap Nayak, steering the TMC government employees’ group from within the CMO, has been dispatched to Darjeeling’s remote Bijanbari block office, diluting his influence significantly.
Forty-six principal secretaries from the prior regime are now sidelined temporarily to the Personnel and Administrative Reforms Department, awaiting redeployment decisions that could reshape careers.
Adhikari promptly named retired IAS stalwart Subrata Gupta as his Advisor and promoted 2017-batch IAS Subrata Bala from ADM in South 24 Parganas to Principal Secretary—a nod to competence over legacy.
Kolkata Police joined the fray, relocating 93 officers prominent in Trinamool police welfare circles to peripheral districts: northern Bengal’s Cooch Behar, Darjeeling, and others; Sundarbans; and tribal western zones like Purulia and Bankura.
This comprehensive reset is poised to streamline operations, curb partisanship, and align the bureaucracy with Adhikari’s agenda. Stakeholders watch closely as West Bengal’s governance machinery recalibrates under new leadership.
