Overview
- The Ministry of Power, which notified the rule changes Monday under the Punjab Reorganisation Act, made them effective at once for the Member (Irrigation) and Member (Power) posts.
- The amended rules end guaranteed appointments for Haryana and Punjab and set a higher bar that includes an engineering degree, at least 20 years of service with one year at chief engineer rank, and five recent years of domain experience, with only a preference left for the two states.
- Officials say opening the posts to a wider pool will bring seasoned, domain-specific talent and that competition will improve performance at the Bhakra Beas Management Board.
- Punjab’s AAP leaders and Congress, along with Haryana’s Bhupinder Singh Hooda, condemned the move as anti-state and urged a rollback, with calls to challenge the notification in the Supreme Court.
- Both posts have been vacant for long stretches—Member (Irrigation) since 2020 and Member (Power) since 2022—leaving ad hoc arrangements at an interstate body that allocates water and power from Bhakra-Nangal and Beas projects to Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh and Delhi, a system that until 2022 routinely seated Haryana over irrigation and Punjab over power.