TEAM HERALD
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NEW DELHI: The Election Commission on Tuesday goofed up with the name of the election observer for Amethi (Chhatrapati Sahuji Maharaj Nagar) district and his cadre in a bid to defend him and deny his transfer to Goa for hauling up Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra for taking out a motorcycle poll rally in the district without permission.
It asserted that “the officer acted in accordance with the law and fully in conformity with the instructions of ECI” and that the decision to post him as the District Election Officer (DEO) in South Goa was in process for a week in view of demand to move out the present incumbent being a local man.
The commission described the officer as Pawan Kumar Sen, an IAS officer of the Goa state cadre. He is not Sen but Sain and belongs to the 1980 batch of the Union Territory cadre that extends to Delhi, Arunachal Pradesh and Goa. There is no separate Goa cadre.
Sain is to take over from Sandeep Jacques as the South Goa DEO after the polling is over in the areas assigned to him on February 19. The Election Commission had, in fact, ordered his appointment as the DEO last week but then decided to defer it till the polling in the concerned constituencies in Uttar Pradesh is over.
An EC press note clarified that there was demand from several quarters during the commission’s visit to Goa last week to shift the South Goa DEO belonging to the state service with a direct recruit IAS officer.
“Sen, an IAS officer of the Goa state cadre was found most suitable for the post and his appointment was accordingly ordered by the commission well before the incident in CSM Nagar,” the press note added.
