New Delhi: Girish Chandra Murmu, the 1985 batch Gujarat cadre IAS officer from Odisha who was appointed as the first Jammu and Kashmir Lt Governor last year, has been appointed as the new Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.
The decision came exactly a year after the Central government reorganised Jammu and Kashmir, bifurcating it into two Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
Official sources told IANS that Murmu has resigned as the Lt Governor. He will be replacing Rajiv Mehrishi, a 1978 batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre, as the CAG.
Born in Odisha’s Mayurbhanj district, Murmu has a post-graduate degree in political science from Utkal University in Bhubaneswar. He was handpicked by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for taking up the challenging job after Jammu and Kashmir became a union territory October 31.
Holding a Business Administration degree from Birmingham University, Murmu is perceived as one of the most trusted serving bureaucrats in the Union Government. Before 2014, when Modi was the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Murmu was his Principal Secretary and was tasked to monitor all the prestigious projects of the state government.
(PNN & Agencies)