PERSONS MAY 2014

PERSONS MAY 2014

• Malavath Purna (13)--- Malavath Purna of Andhra Pradesh on 24th May, became the youngest female climber to scale the Mount Everest. It is a historic feat for Indian mountaineering. Purna was accompanied by Sadhanapalli Anand Kumar (16). He is a Class IX student from the Khammam district of Andhra Pradesh. Anand and Purna are both students of Andhra Pradesh Social Welfare Educational Society.
  
• Saurabh Chandra---- Petroleum Secretary Saurabh Chandra will be the next Cabinet Secretary,replacing Ajit Seth who retires next month. Saurabh Chandra is a 1978 batch officer from the Uttar Pradesh cadre. Previously he was Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion before coming to the Oil Ministry in March.
  
• Smt. Anjali Prasad----Smt. Anjali Prasad who had been appointed Ambassador/ Permanent Representative of India to the World Trade Organization on 26 May presented her Credentials to Director General of WTO, Mr. Roberto Carvalho de Azevedo in Geneva. Smt. Anjali Prasad is a 1983 batch Uttaranchal cadre IAS officer. Smt. Prasad was Deputy Secretary in the Trade Policy Division of the Ministry of Commerce from 1991-1995. Later on, from 2003 to 2006 she was Joint Secretary (Trade Division), Ministry of Agriculture. From 2009 to April 2014, she was Joint Secretary and Additional Secretary in the Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion under the Ministry of Commerce & Industry.
  
• S Narsing Rao--- Coal India chairman and managing director S Narsing Rao on 27 May resigned to his post, seeking to play a key role in the new state of Telengana. He will take up a new role as principal secretary in the Telengana chief minister's office, from June 2. Narsing Rao is a 1986 batch Andhra Pradesh cadre Indian Administrative Service officer who hails from the Telangana region, was appointed chief of the world's largest coal producer in April 2012 for five-year tenure. He is due to retire in 2018. Before joining Coal India, Rao was CMD of Singareni Collieries Company Ltd, owned by the Andhra Pradesh government and the government of India on a 51:49 equity basis.
  
• Mukul Rohatgi----senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi will be the new attorney general (AG) of Indiafollowing change in government at the Centre. He is the eminent Supreme Court lawyer. Rohatgi will take over from G E Vahanvati as the 14th AG of the country.
  
• Ajit Doval (69)---- Former Intelligence Bureau Chief Ajit Doval, was on 30 May appointed as the National Security Adviser.Doval retired in January 2005 as Intelligence Bureau Chief. His appointment will be co-terminus with the term of the Prime Minister or till further orders, whichever is earlier. He is the first police officer who received 'Kirti Chakra', a military honour. Doval is a 1968-batch IPS officer. Doval had worked as an intelligence officer for over 33 years during which he had served in the Northeast, Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab.
  
• Rajiv Mathur(64)-----Former IB chief, on 22 May took over as the new Chief Information Commissioner in the Central Information Commission. He was administered the oath of office by President Pranab Mukherjee. Mathur succeeds Sushma Singh. He is the sixth chief of the CIC. His name was recommended by a three-member selection panel headed by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.Deepak Sandhu, Satyananda Mishra, A.N. Tiwari and Wajahat Habibullah has also served as CICs.
  • There are seven Information Commissioners — Vijai Sharma, Basant Seth, Yashovardhan Azad, Sharat Sabharwal, Manjula Prasher, M.A. Khan Yusufi and Prof Madabhushi Sridhar — against the Commission’s strength of 10.
    
• Russi Mody (96) --- The former Chairman of Tata Steels died on 16th May 2014 in Kolkata. Fondly called the Grand Old Man of Steel, he was known for his man management. He joined TISCO in 1939 and became a director at Tata Iron & Steel Company (TISCO) at the age of 35. He became a Managing Director of the steel company in 1974. In 1984, he succeeded JRD Tata as the Chairman and Managing Director of the Tata Steels. He was awarded Padma Bhushan in 1989 by the Government of India for his contribution to the Indian Industry.
  
• Lt General Dalbir Singh Suhag---- Union Government on 13th May 2014 appointed Lieutenant General Dalbir Singh Suhag as the 28th Chief of Army Staff (COAS). Currently, he is serving as the Vice Chief of Army Staff. His name was cleared by the appointments committee of Cabinet (ACC) chaired by PM Manmohan Singh. He will assume the charge on 31st July 2014. Lieutenant General Suhag was commissioned into 4/5 Gorkha Rifles in June 1974. He will be the second Gorkha Rifles officer to become the Army chief after late Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw.
  
• Nabam Tuki----Veteran Congress leader Nabam Tuki was sworn-in as the eighth Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh for the second consecutive term. Governor Lt Gen (Retd.) Nirbhay Sharma administered the oath of office and secrecy to Mr Tuki in the capital Itanagar. This is second consecutive term for him. He was sworn in as the seventh Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh on 1st November 2011 as a successor of Jarbom Gamlin. He was selected as the Chief Minister due to internal revolt within Congress Party. In the internal revolt 42 Congress legislators in the 60-member house had opposed Gamlin due to his authoritarian rule. Gamlin was made Chief Minister of the State after the death of former Chief Minister Dorjee Khandu on 30th April 2011 in a helicopter crash.
  
• Ashwin B. Pandya---- Ashwin B. Pandya was appointed as the Chairman of the Central Water Commission & ex-officio Secretary of the Government of India. Central Water Commission is a technical organization of India in the field of water resources. At present it is functioning as an attached office of the Ministry of Water Resources, Government of India. Mission statement of CWC is to promote integrated and sustainable development and management of India’s water resources by using state-of-the-art technology and competency and by coordinating all stakeholders.
  
• N Srinivasan---The veteran nuclear scientist died on 18th May 2014. Srinivasan was the first project director of the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research at Kalpakkam. He was the design engineer for the Plutonium (Pu) plant at Trombay. He was a member of Atomic Energy Commission during 1982 to 87. He was awarded with Padma Bhusan in 2000.In 2009; he received the Lifetime Achievement Award of department of Atomic Energy for excellence in science and technology
  
• Sunil Bharti Mittal---- Bharti Enterprises founder and Chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal will co-chair this year’s edition of the World Economic Forum on Africa. Bharti Airtel is the largest mobile operator in Africa and provides services in 17 African countries with close to 70 million customers. The event will be held in Abuja (Nigeria) from May 7-9, 2014 under the theme ‘Forging Inclusive Growth, Creating Jobs’. The meeting is expected to be attended by over 900 leaders from business, government, civil society and academia. Mr. Mittal was also appointed as the co-chair of India-Africa Business Council (IABC) by the Prime Minister of India. IABC has been formed with an aim to provide an institutional platform to strengthen economic ties between business communities of Indian and the African continent.
  
• Former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nedurumalli Janardhana Reddy died in Hyderabad on 9th May. He was 80. Reddy was suffering from liver ailment from sometime. Reddy served as the CM of Andhra Pradesh between 1990 and 1992. Reddy is survived by his 4 sons and wife Rajyalaxmi. She was also a minister in Andhra Pradesh. He was elected to Lok Sabha from Bapatla, Narsaraopet and Visakhapatnam thrice. Reddy was a member of Congress and represented Visakhapatnam constituency of Andhra Pradesh. Also, he was the President of Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee. Reddy took many important decisions during his political career, one of which was to allow the privatisation of professional education. He gave permission to many medical and engineering colleges in private sector. Reddy escaped an assassination attempt near Nellore by Naxal groups in September 2007.
  
• India’s first voter Shyam Saran Negi on 7th May cast his vote at a polling booth at his native place here. 97-year-old Negi reached the polling booth at 6:55 am accompanied by his wife Hira Mani (92). Shyam Saran Negi became the first voter of the country when elections were held for the first time in the country on October 25, 1951 in Kinnaur. The polling was held in phases and other parts of the country went to polls in February 1952. The State Election Commission had recently appointed him as its brand ambassador for the poll campaign in the tribal region. Negi’s name was registered at serial no 123 in polling booth no. 50 on Wednesday and incidentally the booth was set up in the school from where he had retired after serving for 23 years. He was the first person to cast his vote there, followed by his wife.