A number of high profile bureaucrats, including the current commerce secretary Rahul Khullar as well as the previous department of industrial policy and promotion secretary, RP Singh, and the current fertilizer secretary Ajay Bhattacharya, are among the heavyweights in race for the post of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, interviews for which were held on Monday.
The incumbent chairman JS Sarma retires in mid-May after completing his three year tenure.
In all a total of 10 candidates were interviewed by a government appointed panel which included the cabinet secretary, Ajit Kumar Seth, the principal secretary to the PM, Pulok Chatterjee and the department of telecommunications secretary R Chandrasekhar.
According to highly placed sources, Rahul Khullar is the leading candidate for the post.
?Given the overall dimensions and in order to maintain the neutrality and the independence of the regulator it has to be someone senior to the current DoT secretary who is a 1975 batch IAS officer. Hence the panel is likely to select an officer of a senior batch to him?, an official in the know how of the development told FE. In this case Khullar emerges as a strong contender for the post since both Ajay Bhattacharya as well as RP Singh are of 1977 and 1976 batch respectively.
The list of the candidates also includes Subodh Kumar the former Mumbai municipal commissioner who has earlier served as additional secretary in the DoT and was chiefly responsible for the 2G spectrum recommendations which suggested a slew of controversial suggestions such as capping of the number telecom operators in a circle as well as making the operators pay for excess spectrum, the report was tabled in 2009.
The other applicants include Vijaylakshmi Gupta, a 1974 batch IAS officer who was appointed as secretary defence finance in the ministry of defence last year and prior to that she served as member finance in the DoT.