India Post News Service

CHANDIGARH: Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal has decided to appoint young IAS officers as deputy commissioners in all the districts. He reportedly conducted personal interviews of IAS officers up to the batch of 2000 at his residence on March 4 last.

The sources said that Badal had interviewed about a dozen IAS officers belonging to batches of 1998, 1999 and 2000. The officers of 1997 batch had already been appointed Deputy Commissioners during the Congress government.

Badal had one to one meetings with the officers and he reportedly asked them about new ideas of good governance and their areas of interest. The officials were also asked to suggest ways and means for transparent administration. It is learnt that the Chief Minister had cleared the names of certain officers on the spot.

Those interviewed included Vikas Garg and Sumer Singh Gurjar of 1998 batch, Narinder Wadhawan, Satwant Singh Johal, Ajay Sharma and Neel Kanth of 1999 batch, Rahul Tiwari, Alakanda Dayal, Rahul Kumar, Ashok Kumar Singla, C S Talwar and Suresh Sharma of 2000 batch.