Is there anything special about the empanelment of the 1992 batch? A section of key officials believes that the prelude to the Secretary-level empanelment of the 1992 batch of IAS was crafted well in advance and that may reflect well in the empanelment.


When the Centre in November 2019 announced a list of 19 officers (1992 Batch) for holding Additional Secretary or AS Equivalent posts, the relatively small list surprised everyone. When few of the left-outs approached the key authorities, it was indicated that it was well conceived. Presumably, the idea was to consider those names first who could be given priority in Secretary-level empanelment as well as in the posting. The objective was to keep the space uncluttered and to make the establishment's tasks easier in future.

Ten months later i.e. on 22.09.2020, the second tranche of empanelment comprising 14 names was notified. Off late, having augmented the frequency of empanelments, the establishment has been facing difficulties as the availability of Secretary/Equivalent posts and officers awaiting postings have mismatched. The long waitings in posting have been adversely affecting the claim.


This was the reason for the first list (AS-Empanelment) being highly selective with only 15 officers from the batch getting empanelled for Additional Secretary level and four as AS-Equivalent. If some key sources are to be believed, one can easily infer that in the upcoming list of empanelment for the Secretary level post, the strike rate of the first list (November 2019) would be much higher than the review lists that were notified in September 2020, July 2021, March 2022 and June 2022, respectively.


It may be underlined that altogether 32 officers had the eligibility to be considered for Secretary level empanelment in the five tranches of AS-level Empanelment; including ten as AS-Equivalent. But some of them have little chance of getting a berth in the first list of Secretary level empanelment and the reasons include the implication of Rule 6(2)(ii) (foreign posting/assignment) and approaching retirement. Going by this Arunish Chawla and Sanjiv Kaushik may have to wait for a little more for Rule 6(2)(ii) to come to their help. They might not be in hurry as well. 

Further, K Ellangovan has already retired, and Hukum Singh Meena is set to retire in April this year. The same reason may cast a shadow on the prospects of three officers who are scheduled to retire in May 2025 and August 2025. 


Based on certain inputs and analytics, the likely names in the first list may include Pankaj Agrawal (MP), Neelam Shammi Rao (MP), VL Kantha Rao (MP), Rajat Kumar Mishra (RJ), Vijay Kumar (UT), Vumlunmang Vualnam (MN), Vineet Joshi (MN), Sanjay Jaju (AP), Narendra Bhooshan (UP), Nidhi Khare (JH), Rakesh Ranjan (MN), Chanchal Kumar (BH), Shashi Ranjan Kumar, SCL Das, Ashwini Kumar, Sanjay Kumar, Ashish Kumar Bhutani, Neeraj Mittal, Anand Bardhan, Rajendra Kumar, J Radhakrishnan.

Reportedly, seven officers under consideration are said to be borderline cases whereas seven officers who were initially in the consideration zone are ruled out for the first list of empanelment. This also explains it well as several others from the 1991 batch are awaiting their posting and a few review cases from the 1990 batch are to be considered in the upcoming list.