Hyderabad, May 12 : Retired Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Somesh Kumar assumed office as Chief Advisor to Telangana Chief Minister on Friday. The former chief secretary assumed the chair in his office on the sixth floor of the state Secretariat. Priests performed puja in the chambers of the Chief Advisor. Later, officials and staff of the secretariat greeted Kumar on assuming office. The Chief Advisor expressed his gratitude to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao for once again bestowing faith and giving him an opportunity to serve the state. The state government on May 9 appointed Somesh Kumar as Chief Advisor to the Chief Minister. According to the Government Order issued by Chief Secretary Santhi Kumari, Somesh Kumar will hold the office in the rank of a Cabinet minister for a period of three years. His appointment came three months after he took voluntary retirement after he was shifted to Andhra Pradesh following a court order. Kumar was removed as Chief Secretary of Telangana after the High Court quashed his allotment to that state. On January 12, he had reported to the Andhra Pradesh government as per orders of the government of India. He had subsequently called on Chief Minister Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy. He was not given any post on his request as he was also not interested to continue in service though it ends in December. Somesh Kumar, who had served as Chief Secretary of Telangana for three years, is considered very close to Chief Minister KCR. Telangana High Court on January 12 had set aside the order of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), allocating Somesh Kumar to Telangana in 2016. The same day the Department for Personnel Training (DoPT) of the government of India relieved him from the state government of Telangana and directed to join the Andhra Pradesh government within two days. CAT's Hyderabad bench had passed an order on March 29, 2016 allotting Somesh Kumar to Telangana. Following bifurcation of united Andhra Pradesh into two separate states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in 2014, the union government had re-allotted IAS and IPS officers working in the undivided state to the residuary state of Andhra Pradesh and the newly created Telangana state. Somesh Kumar, an IAS from the 1989 batch in Bihar,Awas allotted to Andhra Pradesh by the DoPT. However, Somesh Kumar had moved the CAT and secured an order staying his allotment t o Andhra Pradesh cadre. Since then he continued in Telangana and became Chief Secretary in 2019. DoPT had filed an appeal in the High Court challenging the stay order of CAT, Hyderabad branch. /IANS