Appointments - Current Affairs for October, 2017

Alok Kumar Pateria has been appointed as the new additional director general (ADG) of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF). The appointments committee of the Union Cabinet on Monday approved the appointment of Pateria as the CISF ADG on deputation basis for a period up to May 31, 2020, the day of his superannuation from the date of assumption of charge of the post or until further orders, whichever is earlier. Pateria is a 1986 batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer of the Madhya Pradesh cadre. Among the winners of the President's Medal in 2010 is Alok Kumar Pateria, Joint Director (Policy) who earlier as JD (North) had handled sensitive cases like the disproportionate assets case against Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati and the Provident Fund scam at Ghaziabad court. CISF: Know More

• The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) (established in its present form: 15 June 1983) is a Central Armed Police Force in India.
• It was set up under an Act of the Parliament of India on 10 March 1969 with a strength of 2,800. CISF was subsequently made an armed force of the Republic of India by another Act of Parliament passed on 15 June 1983.
• Its current active strength is 144,418 personnel and in April 2017, the government raised the sanctioned strength from 145,000 to 180,000 personnel.
• It is directly under the Union Ministry of Home Affairs and its headquarters are at New Delhi.
• The CISF provides security cover to 300 industrial units, government infrastructure projects and facilities and establishments located all over India.
• Industrial sectors like atomic power plants, space installations, mints, oil fields and refineries, major ports, heavy engineering, steel plants, barrages, fertiliser units, airports and hydroelectric/thermal power plants owned and controlled by Central Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs), and currency note presses producing Indian currency are protected by CISF.
• It thereby covers installations all over India straddling a variety of terrain and climatic conditions. CISF also provides consultancy services to private industries as well as other organisations within the Indian government.
• The consulting wing has amongst its clients some of the renowned business houses and organisations of India including TISCO, Jamshedpur; SEBI Hdqrs. Mumbai; Vidhana Sabha, Bangalore; Orissa Mining Co., Bhubaneswar; Telangana Assembly, Hyderabad; Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corp.; HIL Kerala; IB Thermal plant, Odisha; IARI, Delhi; NBRI, Lucknow and Electronics City, Bangalore.
• The scope of CISF's consulting practice includes security consulting and fire protection consulting.

India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) has appointed Mr. Suresh Sethi, the former MD of Vodafone M-Pesa Ltd. as its Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Sethi had been selected by the Banks Board Bureau from amongst top contenders for the post, from both public and private sector Banking and Fintech professionals. Mr. Sethi has broad international experience of over 27 years in the Banking and Financial Services industry with Citigroup, YES Bank and Vodafone M-Pesa across India, Kenya, UK, Argentina and US. He has extensively worked in the Financial Inclusion space leveraging Fintech and digital led innovation. His experience in the Digital & Mobile Payments space will be of great relevance to IPPB which aims to deliver financial inclusion with special focus in rural and semi-urban India and among the under-banked segments. Mr. Sethi takes over from the dynamic leadership of Mr. A.P. Singh who had been the interim MD & CEO of IPPB since January 2017. IPPB has been incorporated as a Public Limited Company under the Department of Posts with 100% GOI equity. IPPB plans to leverage the unparalleled reach of the India Post network to achieve a Pan India roll out of 650 branches by early next year.

In a major development, the Centre on 23rd Oct 2017 appointed Shri Dineshwar Sharma, former Director of Intelligence Bureau, as the Representative of Government of India to initiate and carry forward a dialogue with the elected representatives, various organizations and concerned individuals in the State of Jammu and Kashmir. Shri Sharma will initiate a sustained interaction and dialogue to understand the legitimate aspirations of the wide cross sections of society, particularly the youth in Jammu and Kashmir and communicate them to the State Government and the Centre. The move comes in the wake of various steps taken by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi to address the needs of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. On November 7, 2015, the Prime Minister had announced a package of INR 80,068 Crores for the overall development of the State. He has also met the leaders of political parties from time to time and received suggestions with regard to the issue of peace and development in J&K. Subsequently, Union Home Minister Shri Rajnath Singh has also visited J&K from September 9-12, 2017 and met a large number of delegations from wide spectrum of the society. Shri Dineshwar Sharma is a Retired IPS officer from 1979 Batch of Kerala Cadre. During his distinguished career, he has served in J&K, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Nagaland and Manipur and as Additional Director and Special Director in the Intelligence Bureau in the Headquarters. He has in-depth understanding of security related matters and considerable knowledge and experience of issues relating to Jammu and Kashmir.

Georgia announced on 22 Oct 2017 that former AC Milan football star Kakha Kaladze had been elected mayor of its capital Tbilisi. The country's election administration said on its website that Kaladze won 51% of the vote in 21st Oct 2017 municipal election. The 39-year-old played for AC Milan between 2001 and 2010, helping the team to twice win the Champions League. He previously played for Dynamo Kiev and Dinamo Tbilisi and also captained Georgia's national side. He quit football in 2012 while playing for Genoa in order to devote himself to politics and campaign alongside billionaire tycoon Bidzina Ivanishvili to challenge then-president Mikheil Saakashvili. He became energy minister in October 2012 after Ivanishvili's coalition scored a shock parliamentary election victory over Saakashvili's party. In July this year, he resigned to run as mayor of the capital, a city of 1.2 million.

Full service carrier Vistara on Monday said Leslie Thng has taken over as its Chief Executive Officer after receiving all requisite approvals. Mr. Thng, whose appointment is effective from Oct 2017, replaces Phee Teik Yeoh, who has returned to Singapore Airlines. A joint venture between Tata group and Singapore Airlines, the airline began its commercial operations in January 2015. Currently, it has a fleet of 16 aircraft and has ambitious expansion plans, including flying to overseas destinations. He has joined the carrier from Budget Aviation Holdings - a Singapore Airlines Holding Company - where he was serving as the Chief Commercial Officer. Mr. Thng started his career with Singapore Airlines in 1999 and has held many senior positions at the carrier. Among others, he has served as Chief Executive of Silk Air. TATA SIA Airlines Ltd operates under the brand name Vistara.

1984-batch Indian Foreign Service Officer Gautam H Bambawale has been officially appointed as India’s new ambassador to the People’s Republic of China. Along expected lines, the assignment will be taken up shortly by Bambawale who is currently serving as India’s High Commissioner to Pakistan since February 2016. An old China hand, Bambawale had opted for Mandarin as his foreign language and served in Hong Kong and Beijing between 1985 and 1991. He can speak Chinese and German fluently. Bambawale has adequate experience of dealing with crisis with China in the past. During the 21-day tense standoff at Depsang in 2013, Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar was the ambassador in Beijing, while Gautam was dialling numbers from Delhi as Joint Secretary (East Asia) in MEA Headquarters in South Block then. Bambawale is said to share a close working experience and rapport with Jaishankar and had also served as India’s first appointed Consul General in Guangzhou in 2007. Bambawale replaces senior diplomat and 1981-batch IFS officer Vijay Gokhale, who will be homeward bound soon to take up his new assignment as Secretary Economic Relations in MEA. Indian envoy to Poland and Lithuania, Ajay Bisaria is likely to succeed Gautam Bambawale in Islamabad as High Commissioner. Gautam Bambewale: Previous Posts

• In his diplomatic career, Gautam has held wide ranging assignments, including Director in Americas Division of the Ministry shaping up relations with US and Canada.
• He was also Director of the Indian Cultural Centre in Berlin, Germany between 1994-98, as well as Deputy Chief for the Division of National Security Affairs, Defence and International Policy in the Prime Minister’s Office in the past.
• He was also serving as Ambassador to Bhutan prior to his Pakistan posting.

UNESCO’s executive board today chose former French Culture Minister Audrey Azoulay to be the UN cultural agency’s next leader over a Qatari candidate in an unusually heated race overshadowed by Mideast tensions. The US announcement this week that it’s quitting UNESCO rocked the multi-day election and heightened concerns about the agency’s funding and future direction. Azoulay succeeds outgoing Director-General Irina Bokova of Bulgaria, whose eight-year term was marred by financial woes and criticism over Palestine’s inclusion as a member. US and Israel said they plan to pull out of the Paris-based organisation over its perceived anti-Israel bias. Audrey secured a win in her surprise 30-28 vote win today over Qatari candidate Hamad bin Abdulaziz al-Kawari. UNESCO’s general assembly will have to sign off next month on the executive board’s leadership pick, but it’s seen as a formality. The new director will set priorities for the organisation best known for its World Heritage Programme to protect cultural sites and traditions. The agency also works to improve education for girls, promote an understanding of the Holocaust’s horrors, defend media freedom and coordinate science about climate change. Azoulay, a Jewish woman, had started the week’s voting with much less support but built up backing as other candidates dropped out and won a runoff earlier today against Egypt’s candidate. The vote was a huge blow to Arab states, who had long wanted to lead the UN educational, scientific and cultural organisation. UNESCO has previously had European, Asian, African and American chiefs, but never an Arab one since the organisation was founded in 1945 following World War II to promote world peace through culture. The agency’s inclusion of Palestine as a member state in 2011 complicated this push, as did Qatar’s diplomatic dispute with Arab neighbours over accusations of sponsoring Islamic extremism. Azoulay will be the second French leader of the organisation since Rene Maheu, UNESCO’s director general from 1961-74. Azoulay’s father is Moroccan and was an influential adviser to Moroccan kings, so she does have a connection to the Arab world.

Bringing to an end the controversial tenure of Gajendra Chauhan as the chief of India's premier film and television school, the ministry of information and broadcasting appointed acclaimed actor Anupam Kher chairman of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII). Kher replaced Chauhan, whose selection in 2014 ran into rough weather almost immediately with students and illustrious alumni of the Pune-based institute attacking his poor track record in filmmaking and acting, besides his alleged inadequacy to handle the affairs of FTII. Kher's appointment was widely welcomed by the film and theatre fraternity. Anupam Kher: Know More

• Born in 1955 in Shimla, and a graduate of Delhi's National School of Drama, Kher is considered one of the most prolific and versatile actors in the Hindi film industry.
• His acting career spans over 35 years, with critically acclaimed performances in Saaransh (1984), Daddy and Khosla Ka Ghosla! (2006), among others.
• He was also conferred the Padma Bhushan for his contribution to stage and cinema.
• It is not the first time that Kher has been chosen by the government to hold an administrative position.
• Kher led NSD and the Central Board of Film Certification in the past.
• While Chauhan's appointment was confirmed in June 2015, he could only assume office in January 2016 because of a 139-day strike by students opposing his appointment as a political move.

Secretary level appointments: Ayurveda expert as official In a first, the government appointed an Ayurveda expert the secretary of the AYUSH department. In a major bureaucratic reshuffle, the government also made senior IAS officer Ajay Kumar Jha the new expenditure secretary. According to an official order, Jha, a 1982-batch officer of Manipur cadre, has been appointed the Officer on Special Duty in the Department of Expenditure with immediate effect. He will be taking over as the expenditure secretary from Ashok Lavasa who retires on October 31. Advertisement In a departure from the convention of appointing bureaucrats to the position of secretary, Vadiya Rajesh Kotecha, who was appointed the special secretary in the AYUSH ministry in June this year, was made its secretary for a period of three years, the order said. The three-year tenure of Kotecha, a former vice- chancellor of Gujarat Ayurveda University in Jamnagar, will also include his term as special secretary. A Bihar-cadre IAS officer of the 1983 batch, C K Mishra, who was the health and AYUSH secretary, will be the new environment secretary, in place of Jha. Preeti Sudan, a 1983-batch officer from Andhra Pradesh, has been appointed the new health secretary. Chief Secretary of Arunachal Pradesh Shankuntala Gamlin, a 1984-batch IAS officer of UT cadre, will be the new secretary of the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (DIVYANGJAN). Sports Secretary Injeti Srinivas, an IAS officer of 1983 batch from Odisha cadre, has been appointed a secretary, corporate affairs. Former UP chief secretary Rahul Prasad Bhatnagar will take Srinivas's place in the sports ministry. Alok Shrivastava, a 1984-batch IAS officer from Madhya Pradesh, will be the new secretary of the Department of Justice. He was the special secretary in the shipping ministry. Gopal Krishna, a 1983-batch officer of the West Bengal cadre, has been appointed the secretary of the shipping ministry. Ravi Kant, an IAS officer of 1984 batch from Bihar cadre, will be the new secretary of the Department of Food and Public Distribution. K V Eapen, an IAS officer of Assam-Meghalaya, who was at present in his cadre, will be the new secretary in the Department of Administrative Reforms. Ram Moban Mishra, a 1987-batch IAS officer from Assam and Meghalaya, will be the new additional secretary and Development Commissioner in the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises.

Nisha Desai Biswal, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, has been appointed president of the U.S.-India Business Council (USIBC). USIBC is a forum of U.S. businesses under the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The USIBC has been at the centre of a recent controversy after its previous board decided to set up a new organisation called the U.S-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF), breaking away from the Chamber. Former President of the USIBC Mukesh Aghi is heading the USISPF, which has on its board PepsiCo chairman Indra Nooyi and CISCO chairman John T. Chambers, among others. Companies with large commercial interests in India resent the iron grip of the U.S Chamber over the affairs of the USIBC, leading to the split.

D. Shivakumar has quit as the chairman of Pepsico India after serving for four years. Mr. Shivakumar would be joining the Aditya Birla Group where he would be the group corporate president for strategy and business development. Prior to joining Pepsico India, he was the managing director at Nokia India. He also had useful stints at Hindustan Unilever and Philips Consumer Electronics. His exit from PepsiCo comes at a time when the cola industry is going through testing times on very many fronts. At PepsiCo, Mr. Shivakumar played a key role in portfolio transformation and helped the company develop nutrition business. He was responsible for launching winning innovations with the Quaker and Tropicana brands. Ahmed El Sheikh, senior vice-president and general manager for PepsiCo Egypt and Jordan, will be the new CEO of PepsiCo India. He would assume his India role on November 1. Mr. Shivakumar will leave PepsiCo on December 31.

Param Shah is Director, UK operations at FICCI The apex industry body, Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) announced appointment of Param Shah as the new Director for the United Kingdom (UK) operations. Shah will succeed Pratik Dattani whose tenure with FICCI ended recently. Shah has more than 15 years of experience, which includes working for Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) as Deputy Secretary General. He held responsibility of head of FICCI – Gujarat State Council before being appointed for the overseas role. Biju Namboothiri will be the new head of FICCI Gujarat State Council.

Rajnish Kumar was on Oct 4, 2017 appointed chairman of the largest public sector bank, the State Bank of India (SBI), replacing Arundhati Bhattacharya, who completes her one-year extended term on Friday. Mr. Kumar, who is now the managing director of the SBI, faces the daunting task of addressing the issue of huge non-performing assets (NPA) of the bank. The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet approved Mr. Kumar’s appointment for three years from the date of taking charge on or after October 7, said an order issued by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT). Mr. Kumar, aged 59, joined the SBI board on May 26, 2015. Prior to this appointment, he was Managing Director — Compliance and Risk, and Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of SBI Capital Markets Limited, the merchant banking arm of the SBI, according to his official biodata. Mr. Kumar has also worked as Chief General Manager, Project Finance and Leasing Strategic Business Unit, it said. He has held several key assignments across various business verticals, including two overseas assignments in Canada and the United Kingdom. Ms. Bhattacharya became the first woman chairperson of the SBI in 2013. She was given a year’s extension in October last to ensure continuity, as the SBI was then in the process of absorbing five associate banks. State Bank of Bikaner and Jaipur, State Bank of Hyderabad, State Bank of Mysore, State Bank of Patiala, State Bank of Travancore and Bharatiya Mahila Bank merged with the SBI on April 1, 2017. Gross NPAs of the public sector banks rose to ?6.41 lakh crore at the end of March 2017, against ?5.02 lakh crore a year ago, according to a Finance Ministry data. The SBI and its erstwhile associates alone wrote off ?27,574 crore NPAs in 2016-17, according to an RBI data.

Soumya Swaminathan, director general of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), will be the deputy director-general, World Health Organization (WHO), in Geneva. This is the second-highest position at the UN’s health agency. Currently, she also holds the post of secretary of the department of health research in India. The new WHO leadership team was announced by the director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who was elected to the post in May 2017. The team represents 14 countries, including all WHO regions, and is more than 60% women. Every WHO member state gets a chance to nominate a candidate for the deputy’s post and it was India’s turn this year. Dr Swaminathan was India’s nominee. Dr Swaminathan will replace Dr Anarfi Asamoa-Baah from Ghana, who joined WHO as a senior policy adviser to the director-general and had served as the assistant director-general of the communicable disease programme and the HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria programme. Dr. Soumya Swaminathan: Know More

• Dr. Swaminathan, 58, is a paediatrician and clinical scientist. She is known for her work on tuberculosis.
• She did her MBBS and MD from the Armed Forces Medical College and the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), respectively.
• She is one of the three daughters of Dr MS Swaminathan, who is known as the father of green revolution in India.
• Her mother, Mina, is an educationist, and as chairperson of the study group on the development of pre-school children, had submitted a report that formed the basis of the Integrated Child Development Services.

Shashi Shanker has taken over as the Chairman and Managing Director of India's biggest oil and gas producer ONGC. He replaces Dinesh K Sarraf, who superannuated from service yesterday. Shanker is an industry veteran with over 30 years of experience in diverse exploration and production activities. A Petroleum Engineer from Indian School of Mines (ISM), Dhanbad, he also holds an MBA degree with specialisation in Finance. The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) named Shanker, who till now was Director (Technical and Field Services) at ONGC, as CMD till his superannuation, as against an initial one-year term proposed by the Oil Ministry. The ministry had, in a departure from past norms and guidelines, earlier this month recommended to the ACC that Shanker be appointed for an initial one-year term instead of the usual five-year period. During this one-year term, his performance was proposed to be reviewed every quarter instead of the current practice of review after one year. ACC, headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, however, appointed Shanker as Chairman and Managing Director of ONGC till the date of his superannuation or until further orders, whichever is earlier. Shanker, 56, will have a three-and-a-half-year term until March 31, 2021. Under his leadership, ONGC drilled the deepest deepwater well covering a water depth of 3174 meters, a world record. He also led the team to one of the finest drilling performance in 2016-17 when ONGC set a new record of drilling over 500 wells. This is the first time in 23 years that ONGC has crossed the 500-well mark. During his tenure, ONGC has conceptualised an ambitious company-wide project called 'DISHA' for the creation of a paperless office platform, the implementation of which is now underway. Shanker will also be the Chairman of ONGC Videsh Ltd, the overseas arm of the state-explorer, as also its other subsidiaries like Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL), ONGC Tripura Power Company (OTPC) and ONGC Petro- additions Ltd (OPaL).

President Ram Nath Kovind appoints new Governors to Tamil Nadu, Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Assam and Meghalaya. President appointed Banwarilal Purohit as the Governor of Tamil Nadu, Brig. (Dr.) B.D. Mishra (Retd.) as the Governor of Arunachal Pradesh, Satya Pal Malik as the Governor of Bihar, Jagdish Mukhi as the Governor of Assam and Ganga Prasad as the Governor of Meghalaya. Here are the profiles of the new Governors: Banwarilal Purohit

• A public personality involved in social, political, educational and industrial fields of Vidarbha in Maharashtra, Purohit plunged into active politics in 1977.
• He entered the Maharashtra Assembly for the first time in 1978 from the Nagpur east seat. He was re-elected in 1980 from Nagpur south and became a minister in 1982.
• In 1984 and 1989, Purohit was elected to the Lok Sabha from the Nagpur-Kamptee seat and was a member of the Parliamentary Consultative Committee of Defence Ministry.
• He was re-elected from the Lok Sabha seat in 1996 and served as a member of the Parliamentary Consultative Committee on Home Affairs, a member of the Standing Committee on Defence, and a member of the Public Sector Undertaking Committee.
• Mr. Purohit is also credited with the revival of ‘The Hitavada’, an English daily founded by Gopal Krishna Gokhale, a mentor to Mahatma Gandhi.
• Under him, ‘The Hitavada’ became a leading newspaper of central India and apart from its headquarters edition at Nagpur, the daily also launched editions from Jabalpur, Raipur, and Bhopal.
• Mr. Purohit was appointed as Governor of Assam State by the President of India on August 17, 2016. He has been thrice elected as a member of Parliament from Nagpur, twice on the Indian National Congress’s ticket and once as a BJP member.

• Mr. Ganga Prasad was elected for the first time as a Member of the Legislative Council in Bihar in 1994. He has been an MLC for 18 years, and has also served as the leader of the BJP (as also the leader of the Opposition) in the Legislative Council.
• During the earlier NDA regime, he served as the leader of the Bihar Legislative Council for the ruling party.

• The 63 year-old Admiral (Retd.) Devendra Kumar Joshi was the Chief of Naval Staff between August 2012 and February 2014.
• An alumnus of the National Defence Academy, he joined the executive branch of the Indian Navy in 1974. He is a graduate of the US Naval War College, and an alumnus of Mumbai’s College of Naval Warfare.
• He has been awarded the Param Vishist Seva Medal, the Ati Vishist Seva medal, Yudh Seva Medal, Nau Sena Medal and the Vishist Seva Medal.
• Admiral Joshi has also served as Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff, Commander-in-Chief of the Andaman and Nicobar Island Command, and Chief of the Integrated Defence Staff to the Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee.
• He was a Defence Adviser in the Indian High Commission in Singapore from 1996 to 1999. He also commanded the Vizag-based Eastern Fleet of the Navy.

• Mr. Jagdish Mukhi was born on December 1, 1942 at Dajal, Dera Ghazi Khan of Punjab, now in Pakistan.
• Mr. Mukhi took to active politics on June 25, 1975 when the Emergency was clamped. He has been representing the Janak Puri constituency continuously from 1980, winning seven times in the process.
• Mr. Mukhi had earlier held the portfolios of Finance, Planning, Excise & Taxation and Higher Education in the Delhi Government. He was also the leader of Opposition in the Delhi Assembly between 1998 and 2008.
• Mr. Mukhi has been serving as the Lieutenant Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands.
• He graduated in commerce from Raj Rishi College, Alwar (Rajasthan).
• In 1967, he did his M.Com from Shri Ram College of Commerce of Delhi University.

• Dr. B. D. Mishra retired from the Indian Army on July 31, 1995 as Brigadier, after a 34-year career.
• Dr. Mishra was the Commander of NSG (Black Cat Commandos) Counter Hijack Task Force that successfully rescued all 124 passengers and crew members of a hijacked Indian Airlines flight that was forced to land at the Raja Sansi Airfield in Amritsar in 1993.
• Dr. Mishra also fought in the 1962 war against China and the 1971 war against Pakistan.
• He holds an MA from Allahabad University, an M.Sc from Madras University and a Ph.D from Jiwaji University, Gwalior.

• Mr. Satya Pal Malik, 71, was the Union Minister of State, Parliamentary Affairs and Tourism between April 1990 and November 1990.
• After being a Rajya Sabha MP for two terms between 1980 and 1989, he was elected to the Lok Sabha in 1989. Much earlier, he was a member of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly.
• Mr. Malik, an agriculturist and social worker, completed his B.Sc and LL.B from Meerut University and holds a Diploma in Parliamentary Affairs from Institute of Constitutional & Parliamentary Studies run by the Parliament of India.