Know Your IAS: World Bank’s new executive director and 1988 batch IAS S Aparna

S Aparna, a 1988 batch IAS officer and principal secretary to Gujarat chief minister, will be the new executive director in the World Bank representing India, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka. She will be replacing SC Garg. Ms Aparna will get a tenure of three years in America’s Washington DC. An M.Sc and M.Phil in zoology before getting into IAS, she later completed her MBA from…

Swinburne University of Technology Victoria, Australia. She also earned a diploma in French language. She knows English, Hindi, Tamil, Gujarati and French. She originally belongs to Tamil Nadu.

After getting into IAS, she was allotted the Nagaland cadre. Later, Ms Aparna’s cadre was changed to Gujarat. In Gujarat, she served as collector of Valsad (1995-97) and then collector of Bharuch (1997-98). Then, she served as deputy secretary in Gandhinagar. 

On Central deputation she was first appointed as joint development commissioner in the office of development commissioner, handloom. She was then elevated to the rank of additional development commissioner. Between 2005 and 2007, she was a director in the union urban development ministry, now called the ministry of housing and urban affairs, before returning to her cadre to join as Municipal Commissioner, Surat (2007-2011). It was during the period, Surat received the best JNNURM city award. JNNURM means Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission, a Central government initiative then to rejuvenate the cities. Aparna as the municipal commissioner received the award from the then Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh in December, 2009. 

Later she joined as the secretary in Gujarat’s finance department. Since April 2015, she has been serving as the principal secretary to Gujarat chief minister. 

Among the short trainings that she had undertaken as IAS include infrastructure development and financing from IIM-Bangalore, basic course on WTO at Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad, urban management at IIM-Ahmedabad, fiscal policy and macro economic management at National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, and improving governance through accountability from Shimla-based National Academy of Audit and Accounts.