Education Secretary Vineet Joshi Shifted, Naresh Pal Gangwar Appointed Successor

The Centre has appointed IAS officer Naresh Pal Gangwar as the new Higher Education Secretary as part of a major bureaucratic reshuffle.

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The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) on Thursday appointed Naresh Pal Gangwar as the new Secretary, Department of Higher Education under the Ministry of Education.

Naresh Pal Gangwar is a 1994-batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre. Before being appointed as Secretary, Department of Higher Education, he was serving as Secretary, Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying under the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying.

Earlier in his career, Gangwar held several key positions in the Centre and the Rajasthan government. He served as Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, where he oversaw divisions dealing with air and water pollution control as well as hazardous substances management.

He was also Principal Secretary to the Rajasthan government and played a key role in framing policies during the initial phase of the National Solar Mission between 2010 and 2014.

An engineer by training, Gangwar holds a Bachelor of Technology in Electronics and Communication from IIT Roorkee, a Master’s degree in Communication and Radar Engineering from IIT Delhi, and a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Rajasthan.

The appointments come amid heightened public scrutiny of the Ministry of Education following the alleged NEET-UG 2026 paper leak. The controversy has sparked student protests and intensified calls for reforms aimed at making competitive examinations more transparent, secure and accountable.