Uday Kumar Varma appointed as I&B; secretary

Varma succeeds Raghu Menon, who retired as the I&B secretary last month.

The Information and Broadcasting Ministry (I&B) has roped in Uday Kumar Varma as the new secretary for the ministry. The appointment was made by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC).

Prior to this appointment, Varma was serving as secretary in the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Ministry. For the record, Varma had earlier served as special secretary in the I&B Ministry.

Varma succeeds Raghu Menon, who retired end of September 2011, as the I&B secretary.

Until now, culture secretary Jawhar Sircar held the post as an additional responsibility.

Varma is a 1976-batch senior Indian Administrative Service Officer from the Madhya Pradesh cadre.

Meanwhile, in another move, Supriya Sahu, a 1991 Tamil Nadu cadre IAS officer, has been elevated to the post of joint secretary for the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (MIB). Prior to this, she was director, broadcasting, in MIB.

Sahu replaces Arvind Kumar, a 1988 Uttar Pradesh cadre IAS officer. Kumar, meanwhile, has been appointed as the chief vigilance officer for the National Building Construction Corporation (NBCC), under the Ministry of Urban Development.