IAS Rajiv Gauba to lead Indian delegation to Myanmar tomorrow

NEW DELHI: Senior IAS officer Rajiv Gauba, who will succeed Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi, will tomorrow lead an Indian delegation to Myanmar for talks on sharing of intelligence on insurgent groups and smuggling of arms and drugs.

Gauba was recently appointed officer on special duty ( OSD) in the home ministry. He will take over from Mehrishi on August 30.

Mehrishi was supposed to lead the delegation to Myanmar, but it was felt necessary that Gauba headed it as he would soon take over from him, official sources said.

During the two-day visit, the eight-member Indian delegation will hold talks on issues relating to insurgency in the Northeast, arms and narcotics smuggling, and sharing of intelligence between the two countries, they said.

Gauba, a 1982-batch IAS officer of Jharkhand cadre, was earlier secretary in the urban development ministry.

This is his second stint in the home ministry. He had served as joint and additional secretaries looking after the crucial Naxal division among other responsibilities.

India had carried out strikes on camps run by insurgent groups such as NSCN-K and KYKL on the border with Myanmar in 2015.