New Delhi, July 30
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will have several new members in his team over the next few months as a number of officials are headed for new assignments on completion of their mandated seven-year tenure in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

The new-look PMO will have Pulok Chatterjee, a 1974-batch Uttar Pradesh cadre IAS officer, as the Prime Minister’s next Principal Secretary in place of present incumbent TKA Nair as reported by The Tribune last week.

Nair, a Punjab cadre officer, has been named adviser to the Prime Minister with the rank of minister of state in the PMO. These changes will come into effect from October 3 on Chatterjee’s return from his assignment with the World Bank.

A government statement said, “Chatterjee’s appointment will be co-terminus with the term of the Prime Minister or till further order, whichever is earlier.” A Sonia Gandhi confidant, Chatterjee had an earlier stint in the PMO when the UPA government came to power in 2004. He was an Officer on Special Duty when Sonia Gandhi was the Leader of Opposition during the NDA rule and had also served with the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and also had a brief stint in Rajiv Gandhi’s PMO.

In addition to these top-level appointments, a number of other key changes are also on the anvil in the PMO. MN Prasad, secretary to the Prime Minister, is headed to the World Bank but there is no clarity on his replacement. UPA sources did not rule out the possibility of Pulok Chatterjee handling this assignment along with his new one as he would have the rank and status of a secretary.

Among others who are set for new assignments include Additional Secretary R Gopalkrishnan. Joint Secretary Sanjay Mitra has already been named Principal Secretary to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Bannerjee while his colleagues Vini Mahajan and Pankaj Saran of the Indian Foreign Service are also expected to be replaced with new faces by this year-end. The two are on a six-month extension.

The directors who are headed out are DPS Sandhu of the Indian Railway Service, Sudhakar Dalela along with Ashish Gupta (IPS) and Amit Aggarwal (IAS). Sandhu, who has got an assignment with the World Bank, will be leaving shortly, well before the end of his seven-year tenure.