Odisha born IAS Dr Subhash Chandra Khuntia takes charge as Chief Secretary of Karnataka

NEW DELHI (INDIA): The 1981-batch IAS officer Dr Subhash Chandra Khuntia took charge as the new Chief Secretary to the Government of Karnataka on Saturday. He was born in Odisha’s Jagatsinghpur district.nnThe State government had on Wednesday appointed Dr Khuntia as the Chief Secretary. He succeeded Arvind Jadhav, who retired from service on Friday.nnChief Minister Siddaramaiah chose Dr Khuntia, known as an upright IAS officer, to head the State bureaucracy. He has worked in the State earlier.nnThe names of Additional Chief Secretaries Ratna Prabha and S.K. Pattanayak were also doing the rounds. While  Ratna Prabha and Dr Khuntia are from the 1981 IAS batch, Mr. Pattanayak is a year junior.nnSiddaramaiah appointed Dr Khuntia for the post looking at his past records, sources in the State Secretariat said.nnPrior to this, Dr. Khuntia was working as Secretary to the Dept of School Education & Literacy, Ministry of Human Resource & Development.nnHe was also serving as Special Secretary and Financial Advisor in the Ministry of Petroleum & natural Gas.