Nine including NIC chief appear for IRDA member-non-life post

MUMBAI: Nine candidates, including the chairman and managing director of state-run National Insurance Company PJ Joseph, have appeared for the interview for the post of member (non-life) at the regulator IRDA (Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority), according to sources.

The post fell vacant after M Ramaprasad retired on April end. These nine candidates were shortlisted from around 30 applications, sources said.

Joseph is the chairman and managing director of the state-run Agriculture Insurance Company as well as the acting chairman of National Insurance Company.

The interview was held yesterday in the national capital, according to sources who also said the interview was supposed to be held last month but got postponed. Financial services secretary Hasmukh Adhia heads the interview panel.

All the other eight candidates, who appeared for the interview, are general managers at various state-owned insurance companies, such as GIC Re's N Mohan, New India Assurance's KLR Babu and Sanath Kumar, Oriental Insurance's PK Bhagat, Sujoy Bannerjee and Kuldeep Singh.

NIC's Vasantha Krishna and Insurance Information Bureau chief executive R Raghavan also appeared for the interview.

Apart from the banking secretary Adhia, the interview panel comprise IRDA chairman TS Vijayan, former chairman of LIC and Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) GN Vajpayee and department of personnel and training secretary Sanjay Kothari.

Normally a domain expert is present on the interview panel but there was nobody this time around.

The government is to yet announce the results of the past two interviews held on March 18 for the posts of members at life and finance at IRDA.

Bank of India chief Vijaylaxmi Iyer and Exim Bank executive director and former Export Credit and Guarantee Corporation (ECGC) chairman N Shankar were among others who had appeared for the interview of member-finance, whereas LIC executive director Vipin Anand and LIC Nomura chief executive Nilesh Sathe were among those who appeared for the post of member-life.