Former UP Chief Secretary appointed as new Election Commissioner

New Delhi: Retired IAS officer and former UP Chief Secretary Anup Chandra Pandey has been appointed as the Election Commissioner of India.

President Ram Nath Kovind has appointed Pandey to the three-member Committee that has been vacant after the retirement of Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora on April 22.

The 1984-batch Uttar Pradesh cadre bureaucrat was hand-picked by UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to head the state bureaucracy in 2018.

The appointment restores the three-member commission to its full strength, which will now oversee the next set of crucial assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Goa, Manipur and Uttarakhand next year.

Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar are the other two members of the panel.

A notification in this regard was issued by Legislative Department, Ministry of Law and Justice on Tuesday.

He retired from civil services in August 2019 while serving as the Chief Secretary of Uttar Pradesh. Pandey was also the Infrastructure and Industrial Development Commissioner of the state.

Born on February 15, 1959, Pandey has held several key positions. He has a BTech degree in mechanical engineering, an MBA degree and a doctorate in ancient history.

The 62-year-old will demit office in February 2024 on attaining the age of 65 years, according to the age criteria guiding the Election Commissioners.