Shekhar Dutt, a former Indian Administrative Officer (IAS) and a career bureaucrat became the Governor of Chhattisgarh on January 23, 2010. He has been the Deputy National Security Advisor and the Defense Secretary. He served in the Indian Army for a short while and is also the recipient of the Sena Medal for gallantry in the 1971 Indo-Pak war.
Service Background
An IAS officer of the 1969 batch and Madhya Pradesh cadre, he has served in a variety of ministries, including Ministry of Defense and Ministry of Health, and held a number of key posts including the Defense secretary and the Director General Sports Authority of India.
As an IAS officer, he was the Divisional Commissioner of Raipur Revenue Division in 1985. He then went on to become Director (navy) in the Ministry of Defense.
From 1991 to 1996 he served as Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Defense. He was a Director in public sector undertaking boards such as Bharat Electronics Ltd., Bharat Earth Movers Ltd, Mazagaon Docks Ltd, Bharat Dynamics Ltd, Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Ltd, and Goa Shipyard Ltd.
From 1996 to 2001 he held key posts in the Government of Madhya Pradesh, his home cadre. He became the principal secretary of Department of Tribal and Schedule Caste Welfare and also principal Secretary of Department of School Education, in addition to Principal Secretary Sports & Youth Welfare.
In 2001 he was appointed the Director General of Sports Authority of India. It was during his tenure that India successful conducted the Afro Asian games at Hyderabad in 2003 and won the highest ever tally of medals in the Commonwealth games held in 2002.
In 2003, Mr Dutt was appointed Secretary in the Ministry of Health in the Government of India.
In August 2005 he became the Defense Secretary and remained till 2007. In 2007, on his retirement, he was appointed the Deputy National Security advisor for a two year term. This was a new created post dealing with strategic defense related matters. Former Intelligence Bureau Chief M K Narayanan was the National Security Advisor. As Defense Secretary, Mr Dutt took a number of initiatives to modernize as well as bring about probity in the government machinery.
Governor
Mr Dutt took over as the second Governor of the new state of Chattisgarh in 2010.
| Related Links |
