Senior IFS officer moved to ‘weak’ post

The order copy signed by Forest department secretary Shambhu Kallolikar transferred and posted PCCF Upadhyay as the chairman of Tamil Nadu Forest Plantation Corporation Ltd. Chairman of the forest plantation Ltd H Malleshappa is the new PCCF (HoFF), the order said.

“PCCF was normal till Thursday morning but rushed to the Secretariat after being summoned by the minister’s office. Then he cancelled all his meetings for the day and later we came to know the sudden transfer of the officer,” said a senior forest official. Upadhyay is a tough nut to crack and won’t yield to political commitments and we knew that he would be transferred any time and it has happened, said a district forest officer who has worked under Upadhyay. During his stint, he was instrumental in getting encroachments cleared from forests.

Earlier, Aruna Basu Sarcar, the first woman IFS officer in the State, was kept in an insignificant post ahead of her retirement forcing her to fight a legal battle against the Forest department.