A top former bureaucrat and a former Police commissioner, have found cabinet berths in Yogi Adityanath 2.0 government. The former bureaucrat, Arvind Kumar Sharma, has worked closely with Prime Minister Narendra Modi both when he was Gujarat Chief Minister and after his 2014 election to Prime Minister’s Office. A Gujarat cadre IAS officer, Sharma spearheaded Narendra Modi’s flagship ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ business summits, has been made the cabinet minister. Asim Arun, the former Commissioner of Kanpur Police, has been given the independent charge in Yogi 2.0 cabinet.
Arvind Kumar Sharma took voluntary retirement as Secretary, MSME, 18 months before his scheduled retirement date. He is widely reported to have earned the trust of Prime Minister Modi, having spearheaded his ambitious ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ business summits, in Modi’s last two terms as Gujarat CM, during which the state saw a marked rise in economic prosperity and business investments.
He was the CEO, Gujarat Infrastructure Development Board. He joined the Prime Minister’s Office as a Joint Secretary in 2014 and was elevated to the Additional Secretary rank in 2017. In 2019, he moved out of the PMO and was appointed a secretary in the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. After his voluntary retirement, he was elected a BJP MLC.
During the second wave of COVID-19, he is reported to be the brainchild behind ‘Kashi COVID response center’, in Varanasi, PM Modi’s parliamentary constituency.
