Alka Mittal is interim ONGC head for six months, first woman to head corporation

Alka Mittal has been appointed the interim Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), making her the first woman to head the country's largest oil and gas producer.

Mittal replaces Subhash Kumar, another interim head, who retired after reaching superannuation age on December 31, 2021.

"The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) has approved the proposal of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas for entrustment of additional charge of the post of Chairman and Managing Director (CMD), ONGC to Alka Mittal, Director (HR), ONGC for a period of six months with effect from January 1, 2022, or till the appointment of a regular incumbent to the post, or until further order, whichever is the earliest," the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) said in an order dated January 3, 2022.

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Mittal is the first woman to head an oil and gas exploration and production company. Nishi Vasudeva was the first woman to head an oil company when, in 2014, she took over the reins of oil refiner and fuel marketing company Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL).

A postgraduate in economics and a doctorate in commerce, Mittal had broken the glass ceiling in ONGC by becoming the first woman to join the company's board on November 27, 2018.

Incidentally, ONGC will now have two full-time woman directors after government headhunter Public Enterprise Selection Board (PESB) selected Pomila Jaspal for the post of Director (Finance). Jaspal is currently Director (Finance) in ONGC's subsidiary, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL).

The oil and gas sector has two women heading PSUs, with Vartika Shukla becoming the first woman to head engineering consultancy firm, Engineers India Ltd (EIL), on September 1, 2021.

Kumar, who was Director (Finance) of ONGC, had been holding the additional charge of CMD since last April, ONGC had said in a stock exchange filing last week.

"Anurag Sharma, Director (Onshore) has been entrusted with additional charge of the post of Director (Finance) with effect from January 1, 2022," the company had said citing a December 28, 2021 order of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas to this effect.

ONGC's last full-time head Shashi Shanker retired on March 31, 2021, and as his replacement was not selected Kumar, who was the senior-most director on the board, was given the additional charge.

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Government headhunter PESB on June 4, 2021, interviewed candidates to select a replacement for Shanker but did not find any suitable among nine candidates, including two serving IAS officers. The PESB interviewed 9 out of the 10 candidates who had applied for the post of CMD of ONGC.

"Keeping in view the strategic importance and vision for the company and its future, the Board did not recommend any candidate and decided to constitute a search committee," PESB had said in a notice after the interviews.

This time around, a search committee hasn't been constituted so far, indicating that a full-time replacement is unlikely to be appointed anytime soon.

Once the panel is constituted, applications will be sought, which could take anywhere between one and two months. The ACC will take a call on the appointment after getting clearance from the anti-corruption bodies like CVC and CBI, a process that takes at least three to four months.

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