In a strategic administrative move, the Himachal Pradesh government has appointed senior IAS officer Sanjay Gupta (IAS: 1988) to a position with the rank, status, and responsibility equivalent to that of the state’s Chief Secretary. Now the bureaucrats in the state are discussing, why the post of Chief Secretary was kept vacant. Actually, the centre has refused the tenure extension of the incumbent Chief Secretary Prabodh Saxena. Now the government took a strategic move that effectively allowed the state government to position its senior-most IAS officer at the top of the administrative hierarchy under the direct supervision of the Chief Minister. The move has importantly sidestepped the need for formal approval from the Union government’s Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC). Hence, the Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu-led government has avoided the Centre’s influence over high-level postings, a sensitive area that has seen tension between the state and Union governments in recent years.