Appointments - Current Affairs for December, 2015

Senior BJP MLA Jetha Bharwad on 29th December 2015 was unanimously elected as the first Vice Chairman of Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation which sells dairy products under the Amul brand name. Dharwad is an MLA from Panchmahal district and he is also the chairman of Panchmahal District Cooperative Milk Producers Union Ltd. Since it was conceived in 1973, the GCMMF has created the post of vice chairman for the first time this year.

PriceWaterhouseCooper is the fourth largest accounting firm in India. Satyavati Berera became the first Indian COO of a Big 4 accounting firm on 27th December 2015. She will take charge as COO on January 1st, 2016 and replace Neil Wilson who will move to London as global operations partner with PriceWaterhouseCooper. She will follow Deepak Kapoor in the hierarchy. She has been a partner with the firm since the 1990s. The big 4 are the largest international professional services networks offering audit, assurance, tax, consulting and more.

Former Oracle executive Stephen Murphy has been selected as the new President of OpenText, giving CEO Mark Barrenechea ample time to focus on strategy and the product road map of the company. Barrenechea will cede the title of president, but take on the mantle of Chief Technology Officer whereby he will focus on acquisitions. Murphy’s appointment will take effect from January 4th, 2015. OpenText is one of the largest software companies in Canada.

Babawale is currently the Indian ambassador to Bhutan. He will succeed TCA Raghavan who is retiring towards the close of December 2015. He is an IFS officer of 1984 batch and became the first Consul General of India in Guangzhou, China in 2007.

Jet Airways on 22nd December 2015 appointed Amit Agarwal as CFO, prior to which he was the CFO of Suzlon Energy. He will be responsible for financial and fiscal management aspects of the airline business. He has also worked with Arcelor Mittal and Essar Steel prior to this.

He was appointed on 22nd December 2015 replacing Yudhvir Singh Malik who was shifted to Additional Secretary in Niti Aayog. Before this FSSAI Chairman Ashish Bahugana was holding the additional charge of FSSAI CEO. Agarwal is a 1985 batch WB cadre IAS officer.

China has appointed a tough cop as the first counter terrorism Czar to crackdown against Al Qaeda backed security forces in Muslim majority Xinjiang province. Liu Yuejin is a key figure in crackdown on illegal narcotics in China and will now be a Czar enjoying enormous powers and heading national security.

South India based Lakshmi Vilas Bank on 21st December 2015 has said Parasarathi Mukherjee will be the new CMD and has given approval for his appointment for three years from the date of taking charge. He succeeded Rakesh Sharma who has joined as CMD of Canara Bank. Mukherjee has previously worked with Axis Bank and SBI.

Former defence secretary Radha Krishna Mathur has been appointed as Chief Information Commissioner of India on 18th December 2015. He succeeded Vijai Sharma who finished his tenure on December 1st. He is an IAS officer of Tripura Cadre and was made Defence Secretary in May 2013. He is an alumnus of IIT-K and IIT-Delhi.

Delhi HC Reva Khetrapal on 17th December 2015 took oath as the new Lokayukta of Delhi since November 2013 when Justice Manmohan Sarin resigned from office. 4 member panel comprising Lt Governor Najeeb Jung, CM Arvind Kejriwal and CJ of Delhi HC G. Rohini as well as Leader of Opposition Vijendar Gupta unanimously chose Khetrapal.

MEA appointed Mumbai Police Commissioner Ahmad Javed who will retire on 31st January 2016 as the 20th ambassador of Saudi Arabia. He will fill the post lying vacant since Hamid Ali Rao retired in April 2015. Javed is a 1980 batch IPS officer from Maharashtra cadre. He is also the 4th IPS officer to be appointed an ambassador.

Anshul Khetrapal was appointed as CFO of online payments company Freecharge on 10th December 2015. He has 8 years of experience in the sector and also worked for companies like Airtel. He will craft strategies for the payments business at Freecharge and Snapdeal. Freecharge Wallet has over 10 million users and aims to reach 35 million wallets by March 2016.

Taxi aggregator platform Ola on 7th December appointed Joy Bandekar as Corporate President to lead new initiatives. He has over 20 years of experience and joined Ola from Flipkart. He has also worked with organisations such as RIL, Maxworth Orchards and Atcom Technologies. Recently, it also hired Rajiv Bansal to head its finance operations.

Indian-American Dr Vijaya M Rao was named as the chairperson of the prestigious Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) Board of Directors on 2nd December 2015. She has considerable expertise in health services and security matters and was David C Levin Professor and Chairperson of Radiology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University.

Justice Tirath Singh (TS) Thakur was on 3rd December 2015 sworn in as 43rd Chief Justice of India (CJI) by President Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi. He succeeded incumbent Justice H L Dattu who retired on 2 December 2015 and will have a tenure for 1 year, retiring in January 2017.

Sir Venkatraman Ramakrishnan assumed Presidency of London’s Royal Society and was elected to office in March 2015. He became the 61st president of this society joining an elite club including scientists like Isaac Newton and thinkers like Christopher Wren. An Indian American scientist, he received the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 2009 and was also a professor of biochemistry at University of Utah. Founded in 1660, Royal Society is a fellowship of well known scientists.

Mr. A. K. Jain has been appointed as chairperson CBDT in addition to duties and responsibilities as a member of this tax body following the superannuating of Anita Kapur. Kapur will now be advisory on Tax Reforms on contract basis.

NXP Semiconductors NV has indicated that Dan Durn, financial chief of Semiconductor Ltd will be the new CFO. Their current CFO Peter Kelley will now focus on strategy as well as mergers and acquisitions prior to retirement in 2017. Durn’s appointment is from December 7, 2015. Durn will also be executive vice president.