Finance Secretary Ratan Watal gets two month extension

NEW DELHI: With the Budget-making process under way, government today extended the term of Finance Secretary Ratan Watal by two months till April 30.

Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved "extension in service to Ratan P Watal, Finance Secretary and Secretary, Department of Expenditure, Ministry of Finance for a period of two months up to April 30, 2016," said a Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) order.

Watal was due for retirement on February 29, 2016.

Traditionally, the senior-most bureaucrat in the Finance Ministry is named Finance Secretary.

Watal, 60, is a 1978-batch Andhra Pradesh cadre IAS officer and has been holding the charge of Finance Secretary since August last year.

The government has already started formulating Budget for 2016-17 which is to be tabled in Parliament on February 29.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's Budget team comprises Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha, Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian and NITI Aayog vice chairman Arvind Panagariya.

The official team is led by Watal, DEA Secretary Shaktikanta Das, Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia and Disinvestment Secretary Neeraj Kumar Gupta.