Shah Faesal

Shah Faesal (born 17 May 1983) is an Indian bureaucrat currently posted as Deputy Secretary in the Ministry of Culture (India) In 2010, he became the first Kashmiri to top the Indian Civil Services Examination.

His father, Ghulam Rasool Shah, was a teacher who was killed by militants in 2002.

Shah Faesal was 19 at the time.

Not only was his father a teacher, but his mother, Mubeena Shah, as well as grandfather were teachers.

He is a 2008 batch graduate of the Jhelum Valley Medical College.

He holds an MBBS degree from Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS), Srinagar as well as has a master's degree in Urdu.

He finished MBBS at 26 and left IAS at 35.

In 2009, he became the first Kashmiri to get first place in the UPSC civil services exam, which he also cleared on his first attempt.

He was also the first candidate from Kashmir in several years to be selected to the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) through open merit.

He was the fourth Muslim (after Independence) to top the civil service exam.

On 16 August 2012, Faisal was appointed as the assistant commissioner, revenue, of Pulwama district.

He was transferred to the deputy commissioner of Bandipora district on 8 February 2014.

He was transferred to the position of Director School Education, Kashmir, on 22 August 2015, replacing Showkat Ahmad Beigh.

Sajad Hussain Ganai replaced him as deputy commissioner of Bandipora.

Faesal on 26 March 2016 was temporarily given the additional charge of the vice-chairman of J&K Lakes and Waterways Development Authority while Sarmad Hafeez had been sent to Hyderabad for the IAS Induction Training Programme.

During his stint as director of school education, he faced a months-long shutdown of schools during the 2016 Kashmir unrest, causing him to sarcastically post on Facebook that he needed a job, which invited varied comments.

Ajaz Ahmad Bhat took over the charge from him on 18 October 2016, after he had been transferred to J&K State Power Development Corporation and made its managing director.

In 2018, he was a recipient of the Fulbright-Fellowship at Harvard Kennedy School.

Before cracking Civil Service exam, Faesal was the gold medalist at Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS), Srinagar, where he studied medicine.

He was transferred from his post to that of an administrative secretary to the state tourism department in May 2018, however, was later asked to remain on his current post.

Faesal also received the Fulbright-Nehru Masters's Fellowship in May 2018 to study at the Harvard Kennedy School.

He tendered his resignation from the Indian bureaucracy in protest on 9 January 2019, citing "unabated killings" in Kashmir among other things, which, reportedly, was "never accepted" by the central government and he even withdrew the same later.

On 4 February 2019, Shah Faesal began his momentary political life by giving a public speech in his hometown of Kupwara.

Shortly after, on 16 March 2019, he announced his own political party, the Jammu and Kashmir People's Movement (JKPM).

He tendered his resignation from the IAS on 9 January 2019 citing "unabated killings" in Kashmir among other things, through a Facebook post.

He was also generally disillusioned with his role as a bureaucrat, which included jailing people and imposing curfews.

In April 2022, he presented an application for withdrawing his resignation & was reinstated in the service, and in August 2022, he was posted as Deputy Secretary in Union Ministry for Tourism.

On 4 February 2019, Faesal Shah began his political life by giving a public speech in his hometown of Kupwara.

During this speech he compared his experience in the IAS with feeling like having "spent the last 10 years in a jail."

On 25 February 2019, he announced during a live debate on NDTV that he is launching his own political party and has already applied to the Election Commission regarding this.

On 16 March 2019, he announced through Facebook that he would be launching his own political party on 17 March, the Jammu & Kashmir Peoples' Movement (JKPM), at a football ground in Rajbagh area, Srinagar.

Faesal formed the JKPM on 21 March and stated it would provide a political platform to the youth as well as veteran politicians with a clean image.

He later announced that it will not contest the 2019 Indian general election to focus more on outreach, and encouraged people to vote for the right politicians.

He also said the party would focus on safeguarding Article 370 and Article 35A of the Constitution of India.

On 18 June, he and Engineer Rashid announced that their parties, JKPM and Awami Ittehad Party, will be entering into a political alliance called Peoples United Front.

The main points of its agenda were the resolution of the Kashmir dispute based on the wishes of Kashmiris, peaceful relations between India and Pakistan, protecting the state's special status, return of Kashmiri Pandits and release of all politicians from detention.

He left politics on 10 August 2020 and quit the JKPM.

He was reinstated in Indian Administrative Service in April 2022 by the Modi government.

In August 2022, he was posted as Deputy Secretary in Union Ministry for Tourism.

Faesal Shah was born in the Sogam area of Lolab Valley, located in Kupwara district of Jammu and Kashmir.