Rathan U. Kelkar
| Photo Credit: FILE PHOTO
A political controversy has erupted over the appointment of Chief Electoral Officer (CEO – Kerala) Rathan U. Kelkar as Secretary to the new Chief Minister V.D. Satheesan. Both the Opposition Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have questioned the motives behind the decision.
The CPI(M) State secretariat has alleged that the appointment puts a question mark over the credibility of the Assembly elections. The government decision is unprecedented and endorses the Left Democratic Front’s (LDF) charge that the Election Commission of India (EC) had adopted measures favouring the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF), the CPI(M) said. With regard to Mr. Kelkar’s appointment, the CPI(M) also drew parallels with the appointment of Manoj Kumar Agarwal, a 1990 batch IAS officer who oversaw the West Bengal Assembly elections as CEO, as Chief Secretary to the new BJP government.
The CPI(M) and the BJP in Kerala also drew attention to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s remark ‘The bigger the theft, the bigger the reward’ over Mr. Agarwal’s appointment in West Bengal. ‘’So Rahul ji, what happened in Keralam, is it still ‘reward for theft’ or suddenly the beauty of democracy?’, BJP leader K. Surendran reacted on social media on Saturday (May 23, 2026).
It is understood that Mr. Kelkar was contacted on Friday and asked to join the new Chief Minister’s team. Formal order were issued on Saturday trasferring Mr. Kelkar who is CEO Kerala and Secretary, Election Department, as Secretary to the Chief Minister.
Meanwhile, Home Minister and senior Congress leader defended the appointment calling it the prerogative of the State government. He is a good officer. There is nothing unnatural in the appointment, Mr. Chennithala said in reply to questions at a press conference here.
Mr. Kelkar, a 2003 batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the Kerala cadre, has been serving as CEO – Kerala since December 2024.
In recent months, Mr. Kelkar has been in the news for having helmed the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls and the subsequent April 9 Kerala Assembly elections in which the UDF had secured a landslide win by claiming 102 of the 140 seats in the Assembly. Both the then ruling CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) and the Congress-led Opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) – now in power – were opposed to the Election Commission of India (EC) decision to hold the SIR in Kerala.
Once Mr. Kelkar is relieved of the post of CEO, the State government will need to submit a panel of names to the EC to get a new officer appointed in that post.
The General Administration department has also issued orders appointing 20 staff to Mr. Satheesan’s office, including Sreekumar T. as Special Private Secretary, Seeji G.S. as Press Secretary, and Roy Mathews as Media Secretary, Thilakan K.P.K. and Mohanachandran M.S. as Additional Private Secretaries.
Published – May 23, 2026 05:08 pm IST
