Centre appoints six governors; Gen Sinha goes to J&K

The Centre on Friday appointed governors for six states, including Jammu and Kashmir, where former vice-chief of army staff Lieutenant General (retd) Srinivas Kumar Sinha, 77, will go.

Gen Sinha, who is right now governor of Assam, will take over from Girish Chandra Saxena, whose five-year term in Srinagar ends on Friday.

Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Kailashpati Mishra, 77, and Ram Prakash Gupta, 80, will go to Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh respectively.

Mishra, currently vice-president of the BJP, will replace another party veteran, Sunder Singh Bhandari, in Ahmedabad.

Mishra, who began his career with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh in 1945, had served as finance minister of Bihar during 1977-80.

A couple of years ago Gupta became Uttar Pradesh chief minister for 11-months. He was removed to make way for Rajnath Singh. He is now a member of the UP Legislative Council and will replace Bhai Mahavir as governor of MP.

Justice Om Prakash Varma, former judge of the Kerala high court, will go to Punjab with additional charge as administrator of the Union Territory of Chandigarh. He will replace Lt Gen (retd) J F R Jacob.

Justice (retd) V S Kokje has been given the gubernatorial posting in Shimla, succeeding Suraj Bhan.

Yet another nominee from the legal fraternity is Nirmal Chandra Jain, a former advocate general of Madhya Pradesh. He will replace Justice (retd) Anshuman Singh in Rajasthan.