Rajendra Kumar, a 1989-batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer and the principal secretary to Arvind Kejriwal, is one of the Chief Minister’s most trusted aides.
According to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leaders, Mr. Kejriwal and Mr. Kumar are both IITians and go back a long way. While Mr. Kumar joined the IAS after his graduation, the CM started working with a steel-making company but joined the Indian Revenue Services in 1995.
Their paths crossed again in 2013. When AAP formed the government in Delhi for 49 days, Mr Kumar was appointed the Principal Secretary to the CM. He was given the same position when AAP was re-elected to power with a brute majority in 2015.
Problems started brewing for Mr. Kumar when he was given additional charge of Principal Secretary (Home) by the AAP government.
Trouble begins
Lieutenant-Governor Najeeb Jung, at the same time, appointed 1988-batch officer Dharampal to the same post.
Both the officers worked concurrently and even took meetings and signed the same files. It was only after the intervention of the Ministry of Home Affairs — the controlling authority of IAS officers — that Mr. Kumar was allowed to hold the office.
Known to be tech-savvy and an efficient officer, Mr. Kumar held key portfolios even during the Congress government.
He was joint chief electoral officer, special secretary (Commonwealth Games) and the chairman and managing director of Delhi Transco, the State’s power transmission utility.
He was also given the charge of the transport department, but was removed after the December 16, 2012 gang-rape.
His name had also emerged in a corruption case regarding the issuance of fitness certificates for CNG vehicles, but the probe report gave a clean chit to Mr. Kumar.
IT contracts
In 2013, Prakash Chauhan, an AAP volunteer, complained about Mr. Kumar and accused him of awarding the government’s IT contracts without tenders to Endeavours Systems Pvt Ltd.
But no action was taken on the complaint. Two years later in 2015, Transparency International India, a watchdog, sent a similar complaint to Mr. Jung.
It was after Ashish Joshi’s — Indian Post and Telecommunication Accounts and Finance Service officer, who was shunted out as member-secretary of the Delhi Dialogue Commission in April — complaint to Delhi’s Anti-corruption Branch that the matter was referred to the CBI.
On December 15, when the CBI sleuths raided his office, Arvind Kejriwal blamed the Centre and called Prime Minister Narendra Modi a ‘coward and psychopath’.
Since then Mr. Kumar has been interrogated several times and was subsequently arrested Monday morning.
