Chandigarh, Oct 9 (IANS): Aiming for good governance, the Punjab government on Wednesday appointed IAS officer K.A.P. Sinha as the new Chief Secretary, replacing Anurag Verma. He is the 43rd Chief Secretary of the state.

A 1992-batch officer, Sinha was serving as the Special Chief Secretary of the Department of Revenue and Agriculture and Water Conservation.

Verma, who is junior to Sinha, has been posted as Additional Chief Secretary of Revenue, Rehabilitation and Disaster Management, Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare, Horticulture and Soil and Water Conservation.

Verma, a 1993-batch officer, took charge as the Chief Secretary in July 2023. He had succeeded Vijay Kumar Janjua, who retired on June 30, 2023.

In a related development, two aides of Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann have resigned. They are Director, Media Relations (Overseas) Baltej Pannu and Director, Social Media, Manpreet Kaur.

With their retirement, the number of close aides of the Chief Minister resigned rose to four.

Earlier, Onkar Singh, the Chief Minister’s OSD, was removed from his post, while Director, Communications, Navneet Wadhwa had resigned after his term in the CMO got over.

Sources in the government said with four resignations in the Chief Minister’s Office and now the new Chief Secretary, the Aam Aadmi Party government aims to improve its image of governance in Punjab ahead of the Assembly polls in its ruled Delhi.

Speculations are rife that “trusted lieutenants” of AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal will be given crucial post to speed up the implementation of public-oriented schemes and programmes.

The party's top brass in Delhi has been monitoring and wants to regulate the governance for the time-bound rollout of schemes to send a positive signal of good governance.

“The appointment of the new Chief Secretary is also a step in the direction of good governance of the government,” a senior AAP functionary told IANS privately.