PERSONS MARCH 2015

PERSONS MARCH 2015

• Fonseka: Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena on 22nd March conferred the highest military rank of Field Marshal on retired army chief and politician Sarath Fonseka.
  
  There were allegations against Fonseka. Fonseka was sent to prison by the previous Rajapaksa regime for alleged treason. Following former President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s defeat in elections, Sirisena, using his executive powers, cleared Mr. Fonseka of all allegations, including those of treason.
  
• Lee Kuan Yew: Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore's first prime minister passed away on 23rd March. Lee was considered as the architect of Singapore's rapid rise from British tropical outpost to global trade and financial centre. Lee became Singapore's first prime minister in 1959 and continued to hold the post for over three decades.
  
  The south east Asian country which was separated from Malaysia in 1969, was transformed into one of Asia's most prosperous nations during this period. Lee Kuan Yew left active politics when he stepped down from eldest son Lee Hsien Loong's cabinet in 2011.
  
  He stepped down as prime minister in 1990 and continued to be an influential senior minister in his successor Goh's cabinet. He subsequently took over as the "minister mentor" when his eldest son Lee Hsien Loong became prime minister in 2004.
  
• K.M. Mani: Kerala Finance Minister K.M. Mani has received a shot in the arm with the Union government deciding to pick him to head the Empowered Committee of State Finance Ministers on Goods and Services Tax (GST). The committee, which is preparing the framework for implementation of GST, has by convention a chairman from a State not ruled by the party in power at the Centre. The post fell vacant when Abdul Rahim Rather quit following the defeat of the National Conference in the J&K Assembly elections. The Central government has announced rollout of GST in April 2016.
  
• Vikas Swarup: Senior Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer and noted novelist Vikas Swarup of Slumdog Millionaire-fame will be the new spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, ministry sources informed. He is set to take over on April 18. Mr. Swarup is currently working as Joint Secretary (UN-Political) in the Ministry in New Delhi.
  
  The Hollywood movie Slumdog Millionaire which won eight Oscar’s was based on Mr. Swarup’s successful debut novel “Q&A”.
  
  Syed Akbaruddin, the current spokesperson, is to be promoted as additional secretary and has been appointed as “Chief Coordinator” of the Indo-Africa Forum Summit.
  
  The third edition of the summit is scheduled to take place in India on October 29. Reflecting the government’s drive for increased engagement with Africa, this year’s summit is likely to see participation of all 54 African countries.
  
  The role of spokesperson has become very critical with the new government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi on a diplomatic overdrive and a big jump in bilateral and multilateral engagements.
  
• Modi, Kailash Satyarthi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi have been named among the 50 greatest leaders in the world by Fortune magazine in its annual list of extraordinary men and women transforming business, government and philanthropy.
  
  Mr Modi is ranked 5th on the 2015 roster of World's Greatest Leaders with Mr Satyarthi coming in at the 28th spot. The list has been topped by Apple CEO Tim Cook. A notable exclusion from the list is US President Barack Obama, who has not been named in the list for a second year in a row.
  
• Aziz Qureshi: Mizoram Governor Dr Aziz Qureshi was sacked from his post by President Pranab Mukherjee on 28th March. West Bengal Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi was given additional charge of the Mizoram state.
  
• Aditi Arya: Gurgaon girl Aditi Arya was crowned Femina Miss India 2015 at the 52nd edition of the beauty pageant.
  
• Narayan Desai: Noted Gandhian Narayan Desai, known for his rendition of Gandhi Katha – stories on the Mahatma’s life – passed away on 15th March
  
  In 2004, Mr. Desai started a lecture series on Gandhiji called ‘Gandhi Katha,’ which he took across the world and received much acclaim for it. Mr. Desai was the Chancellor of Gujarat Vidyapith from July 23, 2007, but resigned last November.
  
  Born in Valsad in Gujarat, he grew up at the Sabarmati Ashram and Sewagram Ashram in Wardha. Inspired by Vinobha Bhave’s Bhoodan movement, Mr. Desai travelled through the State urging the rich to distribute land among the landless.
  
  Mr. Desai won the Sahitya Akademi Award for Gujarati in 1993 and the Jamnalal Bajaj Award in 1999 and the UNESCO-Madanjeet Singh Prize for the Promotion of Tolerance and Non-Violence in 1998. He was also associated with the anti-nuclear movement.
  
• Abid Ali Neemuchwala: Wipro has appointed Abid Ali Neemuchwala, the former head of TCS BPO, as the group President and Chief Operating Officer.An alumnus of IIT Bombay, he will be heading Wipro’s IT services business and will be reporting to CEO TK Kurien.
  
• AshuSuyash: Crisil, a rating agency has appointed AshuSuyashas its next Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer.
  
  Suyash, currently CEO of L&T Investment Management, will join Crisil on June 1, the rating agency said. Suyash succeeds RoopaKudva, who has been at the helm since 2007. In September last year, Kudva had announced her intent to leave her position as CEO.
  
• D.K. Ravi: The Centre has sought a report from the Karnataka government over the mysterious death of IAS officer D.K. Ravi. Ravi, an IAS officer of the 2009 batch was additional commissioner of commercial taxes and was found dead at his apartment in Bengaluru.
  
  D.K Ravi led fight against illegal sand mafia and lake encroaching. He also unearthed many tax evasions by the builders in Bengaluru.
  
• Ajay Dwivedi: ONGC has appointed Ajay Kumar Dwivedi as the Director. He has worked in the public sector explorer for more than 34 years, holding key exploration-related assignments at different work centres such as Mumbai, Dehradun, Chennai, Jorhat, Vadodara.
  
• Ramachandran: Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president N. Ramachandran has been appointed vice-chair of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) international relations commission, the IOA announced on 18th March. The appointment is for 2015
  
• Ratan Tata: Noted industrialist Ratan Tata will head a new innovative council of Indian Railways, called 'Kaya Kalp', formed to turn around the ailing state-run rail network.Apart from Tata Group's Chairman Emeritus, the Kaya Kalp council will also have two railway union leaders Shiv Gopal Mishra and M Raghuvaiah.
  
• Venkatraman Ramakrishnan:Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, the Indian-American scientist whose pioneering work in molecular biology won him the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, will head Britain's prestigious Royal Society, a communion of the many of the world's most distinguished scientists. Ramakrishnan will take up the post on December 1, 2015.
  
  Dr Ramakrishnan shared the 2009 chemistry Nobel Prize for discovering the precise structure of ribosomes - the molecular machines that manufacture proteins inside all living cells - with Thomas Steitz, of Yale University, and Ada Yonath, of the Weizmann Institute of Science, Jerusalem.
  
  The Royal Society dates back to 1660 and its president is a key advocate for science in the UK and the world. Previous presidents of the Royal Society have included Isaac Newton, Christopher Wren, Samuel Pepys, Joseph Banks, Humphry Davy, and Ernest Rutherford. Dr Ramakrishnan will succeed geneticist Sir Paul Nurse, also a Nobel laureate.
  
  In 2011, Dr Ramakrishnan was honored with a Knighthood in London in a rare recognition of achievements by foreigners based in Britain.
  
  He was conferred Padma Vibhushan, India's second highest civilian honor, by then President Pratibha Patil in 2010.
  
  Dr Ramakrishnan, who will be the first Indian-origin scientist to hold the post, was born in Chidambaram, Tamil Nadu, and studied biology in the US.
  
• Uma Nath Singh: Justice Uma Nath Singh was on 19th March sworn in as chief justice of the Meghalaya High Court. Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi administered the oath of office to Justice Singh at Raj Bhavan.
  
• Sloan Fellowships for 9 Indian Americans: Nine Indian-Americans are among 126 US and Canadian scholars awarded with a prestigious American fellowship worth $ 50,000 to further their research in eight key scientific and technical fields.
  
  The Indian Americans who were awarded the fellowships are Vivek Shende, Nandini Ananth, Hemamala Karunadasa, Prabal Dutta, Neal Mankad, Padmini Rangamani, Shyam Gollakota, Shantanu Jadhav and Suresh Naidu.
  
  The fellowships were instituted annually since 1955. It honor early-career scientists and scholars whose achievements and potential identify them as rising stars, the next generation of scientific leaders, the foundation said.
  
• Katherine Viner: Katherine Viner will be the next editor-in-chief of The Guardian, the Pulitzer prize-winning newspaper and website that is widely read and respected for its independent voice and investigative strengths.
  
  The first woman to run the paper, and the 12th editor of the publication that was founded in 1821, Ms. Viner’s appointment by the Scott Trust which owned the Guardian was greeted warmly by her colleagues and peers. She takes over from Alan Rusbridger, who will take over as Chair of the Scott Trust early next year.
  
• Vinod Mehta: Senior journalist and editorial chairman of Outlook India Vinod Mehta passed away in New Delhi on 7th March. The 72-year-old journalist was the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Outlook India. One of the eminent journalists of the country, Mehta has been editor of several publications, including Pioneer, The Sunday Observer, The Independent and The Indian Post.
  
• AK Singh:Arun Kumar Singh, currently India's envoy to France, has been appointed the next ambassador to the US. Singh, an Indian Foreign Service officer of the 1979 batch.
  
• Arun Singh: India has named Arun Singh, currently its Ambassador to France, as its next top envoy to the US and has sent an agreement in this regard to the American government.
  
  A 1979-batch IFS officer, Singh will be replacing S Jaishankar, who was appointed as Foreign Secretary on January 28 this year. According to officials, government was looking at Mohan Kumar, Indian Ambassador to Bahrain as a possible replacement of Singh.
  
  India has already sent an agreement to the US government naming Singh as its next Ambassador and was awaiting a response from the Obama administration.
  
  Singh, who has been joint secretary in-charge of Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan devision in MEA, has done postings in Japan, Israel among other countries. He has also served as Deputy Chief of Mission in Washington for nearly five years.
  
• SN Sahai: SN Sahai, a senior IAS officer, has been appointed as 'interim' chief secretary of the Delhi government till a regular appointment is made. Sahai, a 1986-batch Union Territory cadre officer, took charge from incumbent D M Spolia, who retired on 1st March.
  
• Baldev Sharma: He was appointed as chairman of National Book Trust. The appointment comes after incumbent A Sethumadhavan resigned with six months left for his tenure to end, following “hints” from the government that it wants to bring in “somebody else”.
  
• Bill Gates:Bill Gates has been declared the richest man in the world for the 16th time by Forbes magazine's annual ranking of global billionaires. The Microsoft founder once again beat Mexican businessman Carlos Slim to the top spot.
  
  Gates' net worth rose by just over $3 billion in the year to 13 February, to $79 billion.
  
  Among Indians, Mukesh Ambani has retained his position as the richest Indian for the eighth year in a row with a net worth of USD 21 billion
  
• Machendranathan: S Machendranathan, a recently retired IAS officer from the Tamil Nadu cadre, is all set to become the next Chairman of the Airports Economic Regulatory Authority. The AERA regulates tariff for aeronautical services rendered at major airports in the country and also determines other airport charges and monitors the performance standards of airports. Any airport which handles over one and half million passengers annually is considered as a major airport by the Government.
  
• Dilip Shanghvi: DilipShanghvi, the billionaire founder of drug maker Sun Pharma has ended Reliance Industries promoter MukeshAmbani's eight-year run as India's richest billionaire on 4th March. For the first time ever, Forbes and the Bloomberg Billionaires Index have also rankedShanghvi ahead of Ambani. The,59-year old Shanghvi's net worth at $21.5 billion is $1.1 billion more than Ambani's net worth of $20.4 Billion. While Shanghvi is a self-made billionaire, Ambani inherited the business from his father the late DhirubhaiAmbani.
  
  According to Bloomberg, Shanghvi added billions to his net worth in the first two months of this year, and his fortune went up by $4.5 billion this year, while Ambani's net worth increased by just $153 million since the start of 2015. Over the last three months, Sun Pharma shares have gained 22 per cent as against a 7.5 per cent drop in RIL.
  
• Thorbjoernjagland: Norway's influential Nobel Peace Prize committee demoted its controversial chairman ThorbjoernJagland in a move unprecedented in the history of the award. The committee, which said the former Norwegian prime minister would remain as a committee member, gave no reason for its decision.
  
  However the renowned diplomat had drawn sharp criticism shortly after becoming committee chairman in 2009 for awarding the prestigious Nobel to newly elect US President Barack Obama. The move stunned the world and the recipient alike, as Obama had been in office less than nine months and the US was waging wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
  
• MODI: Prime Minister NarendraModi has been named among the 30 most influential people on the Internet by Time magazine in a list which also features US President Barack Obama. The list, which analysed social-media followings, site traffic and overall ability to drive news, also includes British author of the Harry Potter series J K Rowling and singers Taylor Swift and Beyonce. Time said the Indian Prime Minister has roughly 38 million followers on social networking sites Twitter and Facebook, putting him ahead of any other leaders in the world except Obama.