PMO publishes Shah’s secretariat roster after RTI request

Six months into Balendra Shah’s tenure as prime minister, the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers has published the names and positions of officials working in his advisory group and personal secretariat, after a newspaper sought the information under the Right to Information Act, 2007.

The OPMCM’s website now lists 25 officials, including five advisers, experts and members of the prime minister’s personal secretariat, along with their designations and the government rank or level of facilities attached to their positions.

The disclosure came days after Naya Patrika published details obtained through an RTI request concerning advisers and personal-secretariat staff appointed by the prime minister and ministers.

Who is on the list?

The published roster shows that the prime minister’s team is not made up solely of political or policy advisers.

Kumar Byanjankar is listed as an unpaid chief adviser with facilities equivalent to a minister, while Asim Shah is the political adviser, also with minister-equivalent facilities. Byanjankar’s role has often been criticised as extending beyond the conventional scope of an advisory position. 

Shah earlier led the task force formed to prepare the “Constitution Amendment Discussion Paper,” which prompted concerns for entrusting the important task of constitutional amendment to an individual without formal expertise in constitutional or legal matters. 

Sudip Dhakal, adviser for policy, administration and good governance, and Bibek Mishra, adviser for information and communication technology, have facilities equivalent to state ministers.

Prof Dr Jagadish Prasad Agrawal is listed as an unpaid health adviser, with minister-equivalent facilities.

The remaining 20 positions include personal-secretariat staff, experts and administrative and technical personnel.

Subash Sharma is the chief personal secretary. Nabin Bhandari is the personal secretary, and Sanjib Pandey is listed as personal joint secretary.

The roster also includes Deepa Dahal as a press and research expert, Santosh Giri as programme and visit coordinator and Bishwo Rai as a social-development expert.

Prakriti Dhakal, Bishal Adhikari and Binay Shakya are listed as personal deputy secretaries. Suman Gautam is an assistant expert for civil aviation, while Rabi Kiran Adhikari is an assistant expert for language and drafting.

At the section-officer level are Surendra Bajgai, listed as a press facilitator; Roshan Tamang, responsible for graphics design; Bedananda Joshi, a personal section officer; and Hem Narayanadas Chaudhary, a research officer.

The roster also includes administrative assistants Anup Thapa Magar, Rishi Thapa, Raj Kumar Gautam and Benis Karki, and computer assistant Amrit Pandey, designated as a videographer.

A disclosure that followed an RTI request

The sequence raises a basic transparency question: Why were the names not publicly available when the appointments were made?

The OPMCM response to the RTI request in late September established that 27 people had been appointed, but did not identify them. The subsequent online roster, however, names 25 people and provides their designations and facility levels.

The office has not, in the material published on its website, explained the difference between the earlier figure of 27 appointments and the current list of 25 names.

That leaves an unresolved question over whether two people have since left, whether the two lists cover different categories of appointments, or whether the personnel composition has otherwise changed. The discrepancy is particularly relevant because the RTI response and the website disclosure are from the same office but provide different headcounts.

The broader secretariat framework

The disclosure also comes after the government revised the framework governing ministers’ advisers and personal secretariats.

The government reduced the prime minister’s approved secretariat establishment from the previous figure of 66 to 48 positions. The current government also reduced the number of ministries from 22 to 18.

The government subsequently allowed advisers and personal-secretariat staff to be appointed under a revised arrangement. According to Naya Patrika, the combined appointments across the prime minister and 16 ministers amounted to 128 advisers and personal-secretariat personnel, based on information supplied in response to the RTI requests.

The publication of Shah’s roster therefore does more than identify the people working around the prime minister. It provides, for the first time on the OPMCM website, a public breakdown of who occupies which position and what government-equivalent status has been attached to each post.

But the government’s own two figures, 27 in its September RTI response and 25 in its October website roster, remain to be reconciled.