The ‘‘cleansing’’ drive in the Human Resource Development Ministry gathered steam as the acting member secretaries of NCERT and the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) were replaced today. Both were appointees of former minister Murli Manohar Joshi.Anil Kumar, who acted as NCERT secretary, has given way to Vivek Bhardwaj, a director-rank officer in the HRD ministry. A senior official explained, ‘‘Bharadwaj’s appointment is to ensure that elementary education secretary, Kusum Bansal, who will be carrying out the inquiry into charges brought against outgoing director, J S Rajput, gets hold of all relevant documents especially those regarding appointments.’’ It may be recalled that one of the major allegations against Rajput was that of nepotism.Sources said that minister Arjun Singh wanted a thorough inquiry against Rajput, another Joshi favourite. Since Kumar had been secretary in the institution for a substantial part of Rajput’s tenure, it would have been awkward to let him continue in the post while a probe was on. That is why Bhardwaj, who never had anything to do with NCERT, was being brought in. ‘‘His job will be to collect all the files relevant to the probe and hand them over to Bansal,’’ the official said. The probe has to be completed over the next 15 days.In another important decision, the ministry today eased out Joshi’s pointman at the ICHR, acting member secretary, Kapil Kumar.It was over Kumar’s appointment last October that Joshi had a major confrontation with the former ICHR chairman, Professor M G S Narayanan. It became so bitter that Narayanan had to resign early this year. Kumar will be replaced by A K Ambasht, another director in the ministry, who will double as acting member secretary.Kumar had been an IGNOU professor and was closely connected with the Left till upto five years ago. He had a running battle with Professor Narayanan in the ICHR council meetings.Kumar sent a letter to the ministry today stating that he had been trying to streamline the ICHR over the past few months. He described the institution as one ‘‘which was a hotbed of politics and misgovernance’’. In fact, Kumar had got wind that he was going to be axed. So he sent in his resignation this morning itself.
