Lieutenant General Gurmit Singh sworn-in as Uttarakhand's new Governor

Lieutenant General (Retd) Gurmit Singh took oath as the Governor of Uttarakhand on Wednesday, 15 September 2021. Singh was sworn into office by the Chief Justice of the Uttarakhand High Court Justice RS Chauhan at the Raj Bhawan in Dehradun.

Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, his cabinet colleagues and several senior government officials including Chief Secretary SS Sandhu and DGP Ashok Kumar also marked their presence in the ceremony. Lt Gen Singh succeeds Baby Rani Maurya, who resigned three years before completing her tenure. President Ram Nath Kovind accepted Maurya's resignation and appointed Singh as the new Uttarakhand Governor.

Former Deputy Chief of Army Staff sworn in as Uttarakhand's new governor

Lieutenant General Gurmit Singh, a highly decorated officer who retired from the Army in February 2016 after serving the nation for nearly four decades, held several prestigious posts including that of the deputy chief of Army Staff, adjutant general, and corps commander of the strategic XV Corps that inspects the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir. The veteran Army officer also handled the China operational and military-strategic issues as an Additional Director General of Military Operations. Singh was also part of a series of expert groups, joint working groups, annual dialogues and China study group meetings for over a decade during his stint in the army. The veteran had made his visit to China seven times for pivotal military, diplomatic and LAC related talks.

Uttarakhand's Governor Gurmit Singh, a scholar on India-China relations

Gurmit Singh, a graduate of the Defence Staff Service Course and National Defence College, has pursued two M.Phils from Chennai and Indore universities respectively besides being a research scholar on India-China Boundary Issue in the Institute of Chinese Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, during his study leave from the Indian Army.

In the meantime, apart from Singh's fresh appointment as the Uttarakhand Governor, President Kovind has also ordered shuffling of governors of some states which includes Banwarilal Purohit from Tamil Nadu to Punjab while retired IPS officer RN Ravi has been displaced from Nagaland to Tamil Nadu as the new governor.

(With inputs from agency)

Image: ANI