Amit Khare


Amit Khare is an Indian Administrative Service officer from Bihar/Jharkhand cadre and is currently serving as the Secretary, Ministry of Human Resource Development He is noted for his role in bringing to light the Fodder scam, in which Rs. 940 crores were embezzled in Bihar over many years, and successive chief ministers
Jagannath Mishra and Lalu Yadav have been imprisoned.

Early Life

He completed his schooling from Kendriya Vidyalaya, Hinoo in 1977 and then finished his Bachelor's with Honors from St. Stephen's College, Delhi. He has an elder brother Atul Khare, who is an Indian Foreign Service officer.

Career

In late 1995, Bihar was in a financial crunch. The then charismatic yet 'native' leader Lalu Prasad Yadav was the Chief Minister of undivided Bihar, where the then finance commissioner VS Dubey stumbled upon the financial irregularities of massive scale. In December 1995, Dubey was, as part of his job, reviewing the performance of various departments. He found that money was withdrawn in excess of the allocation by some of the department. Khare, who was then District Magistrate at Chaibasa, noted that the district animal husbandry department had withdrawn Rs 10 crore and Rs 9 crore twice without giving any details. Even when questioned, there was no response from the animal husbandry department. Finally, in January 1996,Khare visited the office to investigate, and found it looking as if "someone had tried to destroy files in a hurry". Many bogus bills were for amounts just under Rs. 10 lakhs. It seemed that such payments had been going on for years. The next day, simultaneous raids conducted at Ranchi and elsewhere found similar practices. This was the first evidence of the scam, which gathered momentum after regional CBI director U. N. Biswas defied political pressures to pursue the case up to the chief minister level. Those convicted include the preceding DM of Chaibasa, IAS officer Sajal Chakraborty.
Khare has interests in Education and has served the State Elementary education secretary for several terms, and has also worked at the Ministry of Human Resource Development at the center. He has also served as principal secretary to Jharkhand governor Ved Marwah, and as Collector and DM, Patna.
He is presently serving as Secretary in the ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
On 14th December 2019, Mr. Khare assumed charge as Secretary, Ministry of Human Resource Development with additional charge of School Education in background of ongoing negotiations with JNU students regarding fee hike and campus lockdown.