AP government shifts 12 IAS officers, 8 dists get new collectors

Vijayawada: The state govt on Thursday shifted 12 district collectors. While four collectors received extensions in new districts, eight districts received new collectors. AP Transco joint MD Chekuri Kirthi will be the new district collector of East Godavari district. IAS couple Himanshu Shukla and Krithika Shukla — Himanshu served as director of I&PR, while Kritika was the intermediate board commissioner — were posted as district collectors of Nellore and Palnadu, respectively. Nellore collector O Anand was shifted to Ananthapuram. 2013-batch IAS officer P Rajababu, who was recently shifted to APPSC as secretary, has been moved as collector of Prakasam district. Excise director Nishant Kumar was posted as collector of Annamayya district, while secondary health director Dr A Siri was posted as district collector of Kurnool. Prakasam collector Thammem Ansaria was shifted to Guntur, while Ananthapuram collector Vinod Kumar has been brought to tourism hub Bapatla.Additional CCLA N Prabhakara Reddy was posted as collector of Parvathipuram Manyam district, while incumbent collector Syam Prasad was shifted to Sri Satya Sai district. R&R commissioner S Rama Sundara Reddy was shifted as district collector of Vizianagaram. IAS officers Prashanti, JVV Murali, Ranjith Basha, Sridhar Chamakuri, P Arun Babu, S Nagalakshmi, BR Ambedkar, and TS Chetan, who were shifted out of the districts, have not been given any new assignment. Except for Nagalakshmi, all others completed just one year in office. While Himanshu, Kritika, and Nishanth Kumar served as district collectors during the YSRCP regime, they will now head their respective districts under the NDA govt.Chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu advised the newly-appointed collectors to give their best performance by adopting a humanitarian approach. Asking them to mingle with the common people to serve better, he said they play a key role in the success of govt programmes. "You are my team in the districts. Work better to achieve the best results," he said.Interacting with them through video conference, the CM said people have high hopes from him, and it is the duty of the govt to fulfil their aspirations. "I always visit the cyclone-affected areas personally to instil confidence among both people and officials. I spent 10 days in a bus in Visakhapatnam when cyclone Hudhud struck Vizag coast in 2014. This not only helped the administration but also gave moral support to people," he recalled, and asked the collectors to take govt welfare programmes to the people through interaction and, at the same time, be more vigilant towards social media platforms spreading fake news.