Appointments - Current Affairs for September, 2015

V. Shanmuganathan was appointed as the Governor of Manipur by the President Pranab Mukherjee on 28 September 2015 and given the additional duties of Manipur after the demise of incumbent Dr. Syed Ahmed Khan.64-year-old Shanmuganathan joined BJP in 2003. He appointed as Governor of Meghalaya on 20 May 2015.

Ahmed, a former Congress leader from Maharashtra, was appointed as the Governor of Manipur on 16 May 2015.As per A153, there shall be a Governor for each State but the 7th Constitutional AA 1956 facilitated the appointment of same person as governor for two/more states.

Sakhalin took over from air commodore S. K. Indoria who will now be posted to Central Air Command. He was commissioned as Pilot in transport stream of IAF in June 1980s. He is an
alumnus of Defence Services Staff College, Wellington and a qualified flying instructor who has flown over 5500 hours on AN-32 and Boeing-737. A chief flying instructor in a training establishment, Saklani has commanded a transport squadron at a busy transport base in East. The air commodore was director transport operations at Air HQ before taking over as air officer commanding 12Wing, AF. He has been honoured with the Vayu Sena Medal.

Real estate portal Housing Dot Com has announced that Keerthi Kiran has been appointed Vice President of its fresh real estate projects unit. He has served in various capacities at the portal for 2 years now. Keerthi will report to Housing.com's Chief Business Officer, Jason Kothari. He holds a B.Tech in engineering from IIT Bombay. Housing dot com has more than 2550 employees spread over 50 cities in the nation.

Matthias Muller was appointed as CEO of VW group succeeding Martin Winterkorn who resigned following the diesel emissions scandal. Muller is presently Chairman of Porsche AG and board member of VW AG. He will continue to head VW till the end of February 2020. Muller commenced his professional career with AUDI AG, a member of the VW Group. He became Head of the Systems Analysis Division in the 1980s at Ingolstadt. He later worked for product management at Audi AG, SEAT and Lamborghini. He moved to Wolfsburg heading product management at VW Group and the brand in 2007. He became General Representative of VW Group after this.

S. K. Sharma was appointed as Chairman of Bhakra Beas Management Board w.e.f 25th September 2015, succeeding A.B. Agrawal, the chairman of a period for 5 years. Sharma is a civil engineering graduate from Punjab Engineering College, Chandigarh. He joined the irrigation and water resources department of Haryana in 1980 as a sub divisional officer. He has monitored several regulation related hydraulic systems, pump housing systems, canal and drainage networks as well as NABARD projects.

Government of India has established a committee led by Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Arvind Panagariya for restoration of urea plants and progress of a gas pipeline entailing investment of INR 23,000 crore. The revival of closed state run urea plants in Barauni, Gorakhpur and Sindri will be taken up by the committee. Committee will work on to establish the single window mechanism to provide required approvals for revival of three urea plants, and the gas pipeline, and provide an investment of Rs 5,000 with each urea plant attaining investment of Rs 6,000 crore. The government has already invited bids for revival of urea plants at Gorakhpur and Sindri through bidding process and the selected investor will have to set up, design, finance, construct, establish, operate and maintain a gas-based urea plant for a term of 33 years. State-operated GAIL is setting up about 2000 km Jagdishpur-Phulpur-Haldia pipeline to meet NE state demands. India's annual requirement of urea is 30 million tonnes, while the domestic production is static at 22 million tonnes, the remaining is met through imports.

Rear Admiral Sanjay Mahindru has assumed duties of Flag Officer Submarines from Rear Admiral S. V. Bokhare on 25th September 2015. Mahindru was commissioned on January 1st, 1985 and has served 27 years in the submarine unit. Prior to command of nuclear submarine Arihant, he commended a conventional submarine, destroyer and frigate. An alumnus of the College of Naval Warfare, he has also finished a staff course in the UK.

Automotive Research Association of India has appointed Rajan Wadhera as its new President. Vikram Kirloskar has been appointed the Vice President. While Wadhera is President and CEO - Truck and Powertrain- at M&M, Kirloskar is vice chairman of Toyota Kirloskar Motor. ARAI is concerned with the issues like road safety, emission norms, fuel efficiency and various other technologies relevant for safer and cleaner vehicles. It is an autonomous body engaged in R&D activities in the auto sector approved as testing agency by the Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises.

A 1978 batch IAS officer, Stuti Narain Kacker was on 24th September 2015 appointed as head of National Commission for Protection of Child Rights by the Union Women and Child Development Ministry.  She is ex secretary of the Department of Disability Affairs at MSOJ&E looking after the management committee of CARA. Former UPA appointee Kushal Singh’s tenure closes. NCPCR was established in March 2007 under Commission for Protection of Child Rights Act 2005. According to the NCPCR act, the 6 member body must have 2 lady reps.

e-Commerce giant Flipkart has appointed three former Amazon, Google and Microsoft senior executives for different roles in the company on 22nd September 2015. The firm appointed Amazon's Dan Rawson as head of Customer Logistics and Supply Chain Ecosystems. Google’s Ravi Byakod is appointed as director of engineering and Accounting and Anand Lakshminarayanan from Microsoft as head of product management for Digital Goods and Services. Rawson is a former captain in the US Marines and worked as GM of Fulfilment in the US for Amazon. Ravi Byakod will oversee the company’s finances and Flipkart will leverage A. Lakshminarayanan’s expertise in the field of work digital offerings. He has previously worked in MSN and eBay.

Home services firm Housejoy has appointed former Flipkart VP Saran Chatterjee as its first CEO when it will look to expand to other cities in the year. Chatterjee joined Housejoy in December and this Bengaluru based firm provides basic door to door services like computer fixing, laundry services, electric repairing and laundry services. He joined Flipkart in 2012.

US bike maker has appointed Vikram Pawah as the new MD of its India operations w.e.f 21st September 2015. Pawah has replaced Anoop Prakash as the new MD of Harley Davidson Canada. Pawah will manage the Harley Davidson India leadership team for in country sales, dealer network management, marketing, services and operation activities. Paw has previously worked with Honda in India and Australia prior to which he worked with Jay Engineering Works Ltd, a market leader in the manufacturing of USHA brand fans, sewing machines and fuel injection equipment, as well as Fun Foods India Ltd.

Motilal Oswal Financial Services has appointed Kunal Marwah as head and director of its international business. Previously, Marwah worked with ICICI Prudential Asset Management Company as head of international business and formulated strategic partnerships with asset managers and investors in countries like Europe, Middle East, Hong Kong and Japan. Wealth management, retail broking and distribution, institutional broking, asset management, PE and commodity broking as well as principal strategies are the key areas in which Motilal Oswal has worked.

Sunil Duggal will take over as the new chief executive officer of Hindustan Zinc Ltd we.f October 1, 2015. Duggan is currently deputy CEO and he will also become a whole time director of Hindustan Zinc. His elevation comes when current CEO Akhilesh Joshi is going to take over as whole time director of HZL and president, global zinc business of Vedanta Group.

Sreedharan, the Principal Advisor to Delhi Metro Rail Corporation, has been invited by the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to serve on his HLAG-ST as per a DMRC release on 18th September 2015. Service is for period of 3 years. Sreedharan has accepted the offer.

IT major Cognizant has named former PepsiCo exec Zein Abdalla to its BoD on 17th September 2015. He was president of PepsiCo from September 2012 to retirement in December recently.
Mr. Abdalla, 57, will serve as a board member until the company’s annual stockholders’ meeting in 2016, as per the release.

USD 15 billion engineering group Larsen and Toubro has appointed former India head of GSK Pharma, H. Joshipura as the head of its corporative initiatives ahead of its strategic plan Project Lakhsya. IIM-A and L&T chairman Naik worked closely with him during the time spent in institution for selecting its director.

Google has hired former auto industry Hyundai honcho and auto industry veteran John Krafcik to run the self driving car program at Google. He is credited with the huge sales release following the Great Recession at Hyundai. Towards the start of his career as a mechanical engineer, he brought forth a JV between Toyota and GM when be became the proponent of lean manufacturing. Krafcik will take over as autonomous car CEO later in the month.

Traditional automakers have also worked towards complete automation and this is a new field for Google. To learn the tricks of driving, its cars have driven more than 1 million miles on highways or city streets. Krafcik is a Stanford trained mechanical engineer who has worked at Toyota, Ford and Lincoln Navigator. With this hire, Google has set the stage for a separate autonomous car company under the new holding company called as Alphabet.

Paytm has hired former Airtel and Samsung senior executive Nitin Misra to head its product pipeline for core payments business. The firm is looking to build a second tier of leaders to strengthen critical operations through this move.

Hormusji N Cama, Director of Bombay Samachar (the oldest continually published newspaper in India from 1855)and Riyad Mathew, Director of Malayala Manorama, were unanimously elected Chairman and Vice Chairman respectively of the Press Trust of India.

Cama succeeds Mahendra Mohan Gupta, Chairman and Managing Director of the Jagran Prakashan while Mathew succeeds him as Vice Chairman.

Cama has served two terms as INR President and he is currently Chairman of Readership Studies Council of India apart from being the board of ABC and Council for Fair Business Practices. Mathew has worked as a AP correspondent in Washington before joining Malayala Manorama.

Apart from Cama, Gupta and Mathew, other members of the PTI board include: K.N. Shanth Kumar/Deccan Herald, Vineet Jain/TOI, Aveek Kumar Sarkar/Ananda Bazar Patrika, Viveck Goenka/Indian Express, N Ravi/The Hindu, M.P. Veerendra Kumar/ Mathrubhumi, Sanjoy Narayan/Hindustan Times, Vijay Kumar Chopra/Hind Samachar and R. Lakshmipathy/Dinamalar.

Nintendo has named Tatsumi Kimishima as the president of the company at a board meeting where new title of creative fellow was announced for senior MD and star game designer Shigeru Minamoto. Another senior executive, Genyo Takeda was appointed as the Technology Fellow. Kimishima has been MD of the company and with Nintendo since 2000. Iwata was president from 2002 till 2014. Nintendo has decided to go into games for mobile devices early this year, a move it was against during Iwata’s time.

Ravi Venkatesan has been appointed as chairman, BOB. He is also the chairman and founder of Social Ventures Partner India and the author of “Conquering the Chaos: Win in India, Win Everywhere” published by Harvard Business Review.

Microsoft has provided executive Brad Smith with a new leadership position as a president and chief legal officer. He was the executive VP of Microsoft since 2011. The 56 year old joined the company in 1993 and has held several positions including that of company secretary. He has been Microsoft’s General Counsel since 2002.

Hewlett Packard CEO Meg Whitman has joined the board of SurveyMonkey w.e.f 12th September 2015. The unicorn startup was valued at USD 2 billion in December 2014. During this time, it raised USD 250 million. Others on the board include Sheryl Sandberg. Current CEO of SurveyMonkey is Bill Veghte. SurveyMonkey now has 9 board members.

CEO, IPG Mediabrands Shashindra Sinha has been elected as the chairman of ABC for the forthcoming fiscal year. He is expected to implement digital measurement project undertaken by ABC. Sinha is actively involved in industry bodies like BARC, ASCI, RSCI and more. ABC has taken on an additional role to measure digital audiences and this follows growth in digital ads. Due to increased smartphone usage, digital ads are the fastest growing medium with high amount of revenue potential. Digital measurement services provided by ABC will apply to digital properties that seek numerical measurement which transparent and sound. ABC is the proven technology partner and digital properties to be measured will be tagged. This will assist digital media agencies and advertisers who can look at a comprehensive measurement tool along with authentication from ABC. This will lead to a well planned expansion of digital advertising.

Rakesh Maria has been appointed as DG Home Guards while Javed Ahmed has been appointed as Mumbai Police Commissioner after post has been upgraded to DG rank. This exchange of positions happened following the commencement of investigations into the Sheena Bora murder case. Maria is currently still in charge of the case, even as the ED has been asked to step in.

J. Manjula is DRDO’d first woman DG and was previously the Director of Defence Avionics Research Establishment in Bengaluru since the month of July 2014. An outstanding DRDO scientist, she took charge from K.D. Nayak on 9th September 2015. She will report to the Secretary Director General. She is an alumna of Osmania University and joined the DRDO in the 1980s. Her specialisation is in the area of communication configuration and radar ESM and ECM systems. She has won the DRDO awards for excellence in performance, Scientist of the Year award for 2011 and India Today Woman Summit Award for 2014

Following Pravin Sinclair’s ouster, the name of H. Senapathy was preferred on account of his wide experience. Am alumnus of BJB college and Ravenshaw College, he did a doctorate from Deiv Ahilya University in MP and has also worked as a UNESCO fellow. Search committee comprised BHU VC G C Tripathi, I K Bhat, director of NIT, Jaipur, Shyama Chona, former principal of DPS, RK Puram and M K Sridhar, professor of Canara Bank School of Management Studies and member of Karnataka Knowledge Commission.

K. V. Rama Moorthy has been appointed as the new ED of United Bank of India on August 29th 2015. He was the ED of Bank of Baroda before this. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Agriculture besides a certificate from CAIIB.

Balanchandran M. has been re-appointed as Non Executive Chairman of the NPCI for the second time for a period of two years. Prior to this, he had also taken charge of the non-executive chairman pst following the resignation of Narayan Murthy.