New Delhi: K N Srivastava, Special Secretary and Financial Adviser in the External Affairs Ministry, was on Thursday appointed the new Secretary in the Civil Aviation Ministry.
He will take over from Syed Nasim Ahmad Zaidi on his retirement on July 31, an official release said.
Zaidi, 1976 batch IAS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre, has been nominated by the government to contest the prestigious election to the post of President of the UN-body, International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). Srivastava, a Karnataka-cadre IAS officer of the 1978 batch, was posted as a Joint Secretary in the Civil Aviation Ministry from 2006 to 2009.
Thereafter, he was shifted to the Ministry of Culture for a brief period before he took over as Additional Secretary and Financial Advisor in External Affairs. He was promoted as a Special Secretary and Financial Advisor in April. It is also learnt that Prashant Sukul, a Joint Secretary in Civil Aviation Ministry who recently took additional charge of the Director General Civil Aviation (DGCA), is being posted to the ICAO headquarters in Montreal as India`s permanent representative.
He would swap places with Arun Misra, who has returned from ICAO and is likely to take over as the DGCA chief.
Earlier this month, Sukul had taken over as DGCA chief from E K Bharat Bhushan, who was abruptly removed for taking a tough stand against Kingfisher Airlines, a charge denied by the government.
Bhushan is now the Additional Secretary and Financial Adviser in the Steel Ministry.
He also swapped the position with S Machendranathan who recently joined Civil Aviation as Additional secretary.
Both Bhushan and Machendranathan belong to the 1979 batch of the IAS, though the former belongs to the Kerala cadre and the latter to the Tamil Nadu cadre.

PTI