Revenue Secretary V. Venu has gone on leave reportedly expressing his displeasure over the Cabinet decision to ease out Survey Director V.R. Premkumar and appoint V. Girija without taking him into confidence.
The Cabinet decision comes at a time when resurvey has recorded significant progress and modernisation of the Survey Department was in its conceptional stage.
Revenue Department sources told The Hindu that the decision to ease out the incumbent was made without holding any consultation with Mr. Venu. Mr. Premkumar had been reporting to Mr. Venu and the decision to move out the former is feared to slacken the modernisation and other similar initiatives that were being managed by them.
Mr. Venu is learnt to have handed over the leave letter to Chief Secretary Tom Jose. Mr. Venu is also the Chief Executive Officer of Rebuild Kerala Initiative that is being directly monitored and executed by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.
Frequent reshuffle of officers holding key positions had drawn flak from the IAS fraternity as it would upset the projects they are heading and the officers’ association had expressed its resentment too.
