Former Air India chief Sunil Arora is new I&B Ministry secretary

Senior IAS officer Sunil Arora was on Friday appointed as the new Secretary in the Information and Broadcasting Ministry, succeeding Bimal Julka whose tenure ends on Monday.

The appointment of Arora, a 1980-batch IAS officer of Rajasthan cadre and presently Secretary Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, comes at a time when the I&B ministry is in the midst of several important activities including the e-auctions of Phase III FM radio stations and Phase III and IV of Digitisation.

The ministry has also been under fire over the two-month- old impasse at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) where students are demanding removal of Gajendra Chauhan as the institute's chairman.

Earlier, Arora has also functioned as the CMD of Air India.