Reacting to the sacking of Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami, Congress leader Manish Tiwari described the entire episode as a sad commentary on the functioning of the union government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“It’s a sad commentary on the functioning of government. The fundamental questions is how did this happen? This means government has no control over the instrumentality of governance?” he said.
Anil Goswami was removed as Home Secretary yesterday night in the wake of controversy over his alleged attempt to stall the arrest of Saradha scam accused Matang Sinh, a former Congress minister in the UPA government at the Centre.
Rural Development Secretary LC Goyal has taken over as the new Home Secretary today.
Goswami would have continued in the post till June 30 but was asked to resign after which he submitted his resignation.
The exit of Goswami, a UPA government appointee, came following media reports that he had tried to prevent CBI officers from carrying out Sinh’s arrest on Saturday.
The continuance of Goswami became untenable after he had admitted to Home Minister Rajnath Singh that he had spoken to CBI officials before they arrested Sinh in Kolkata on Saturday, reports said.
Goswami, a 1978-batch IAS officer of Jammu and Kashmir cadre, was appointed as Home Secretary in 2013 during the tenure of UPA Government. He was said to have been close to Matang Sinh, a controversial politician from Assam who was a Minister of State for Home in PV Narasimha Rao’s government.
This is the second instance of the removal of a top bureaucrat in a week after Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh’s services were curtailed last Wednesday after she refused to resign from the post. While there were no allegations of impropriety against her, the Government is said to have been unhappy with her leadership of the Ministry.
