Ranchi: Governor Ramesh Bais on Thursday administered the oath of office to the retired Judge of Jharkhand High Court (JHC) Justice Amitav Kumar Gupta as the Chairman of Jharkhand State Electricity Regulatory Commission (JSERC) at the Durbar Hall of Raj Bhawan.
Chief minister (CM) Hemant Soren, Chief Secretary Sukhdev Singh, Principal Secretary of energy department Avinash Kumar besides principal secretary to Chief Minister Rajiv Arun Ekka, principal secretary to governor Nitin Madan Kulkarni and Advocate General Rajiv Ranjan and many dignitaries were present at the swearing-in ceremony. The family members of Justice Gupta were also present. The Governor extended his best wishes to the newly appointed chairman.
On September 9, Energy Secretary Avinas Kumar had issued a notification notifying the appointment of retired HC judge Gupta as JSERC chairman. The post of chairman has been vacant for the last 15 months after the resignation of Arvind Prasad in June last year. Now with the appointment of Justice Gupta, the vacancy has been filled and the three-member commission has got its full bench.
The appointment has been done for five years. The High Court itself was monitoring the appointment of members and the chairman. On May 19, two new members were appointed to the commission. The members include retired Principal District Judge Mahendra Prasad and retired project director of Jharkhand Urja Sancharan Corporation Atul Kumar. Prasad is a member (law) while Kumar is a member (technical).
Jharkhand Electricity Regulatory Commission, an important constitutional body of the state, became defunct on 19 February 2021 after the last member Pravas Kumar Singh left the commission to become member (law) of the Central Regulatory Commission. In June last year, outgoing chairman Arvind Prasad had resigned while member technical RN Singh retired on January 9.