In a major bureaucratic reshuffle a total of 16 secretaries have been appointed to various central government departments. One such important shuffle was of Ajay Prakash Sawhney who will be today taking the charge as Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), replacing Aruna Sundararajan who will be the new Telecom Secretary. Ajay Prakash Sawhney was earlier additional secretary in the petroleum ministry, with the charge of chairman and managing director of PSU explorer Oil India.
Sawhney is a Mechanical Engineer and an IAS Officer of Andhra Pradesh cadre (1984 batch). He has handled various assignments in the State of Andhra Pradesh, covering land administration, law and order and quasi-judicial functions, rural development, health & family welfare, communication & information technology, e-governance and elections etc.
He played a lead role in the Total Literacy Campaign taken up in Nizamabad district in the early nineties. He has also catalysed the establishment of the International Institute of Information Technology in Hyderabad and its emergence as one of the premier institutions in computer science education and research in the country. He has spent more than ten years in assignments relating to information technology and e-governance and has led the formulation of innovative policies and implementation of several major e-governance, communications and broadband projects. He has also worked as the Principal Secretary to Chief Minister of AP after the reorganization of the State of Andhra Pradesh.
He has also held important positions in the Govt. of India as Joint Secretary Training in the Department of Personnel and Training and as the President and CEO of the National e-Governance Division, which assists the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology in the implementation of the National e-Governance Plan.