Very few among the civil servants get an opportunity to serve in the area they are basically strong at, that too during the pinnacle of their career or towards its end. C. Parthasarathi, who held the position of Secretary (Agriculture) and Agriculture Production Commissioner for five years during 2015-2020, is one such fortunate officer.
Mr. Parthasarathi, who was selected to the IAS under the State Civil Service category in 1993, and holding office as Director General of Environmental Protection Training and Research Institute (EPTRI), will now hang his boots on attaining the age of superannuation on Thursday. Having passed B.Sc (Agriculture) and M.Sc (Agriculture-Agronomy), both with distinction from the Agricultural University, he was initially selected to Group-I services in the State.
After his selection to the IAS, Mr. Parthasarathi was posted as Joint Collector at Anantapur and Warangal and District Collector at Karimnagar. “However, most satisfying years of my career were in the Agriculture Department as Secretary and APC after formation of Telangana state”, Mr. Parthasarathi said.
He was in the thick of action in implementing the State government’s two flagship programmes meant for the farming community – the input support scheme (Rythu Bandhu) and group life insurance scheme (Rythu Bima) from the conceptual stage, following Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s decision to implement such interventions. The two had become role models for the country and overseas and the Centre has formulated its Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Yojana based on Rythu Bandhu.
“With the support of those at the helm of affairs, the Agriculture department was successful in taking the foodgrains production from 68.22 lakh tonnes in 2015-16 to a whopping 241.41 tonnes in 2019-20 with a rapid increase in the interregnum – 140.71 tonnes in 2016-17; 133.49 lakh tonnes in 2017-18 and 130.65 lakh tonnes in 2018-19 by improving upon delivery systems in the matter of seed, fertilizer, mechanisation and others”, Mr. Parathasarathi said, looking back on the times of highlight of his career.
Hosting OECD Seed programme conference, ISTA Congress and attending FAO summit were also among the satisfying moments of his career as they helped him improve the functioning of the Agriculture department, Mr. Parathsarathi said.
