With Pathak taking charge, Shri Burra Vamsi Rama Mohan, Chairman and Managing Director, has relinquished the additional charge of Director (Projects). Prior to the appointment, Pathak was Executive Director, OSD (Projects), and had led major initiatives including the Arun-3 SAPDC Transmission Project in Nepal. He also has extensive experience in the development and commissioning of EHV transmission lines and substations.

The appointment is expected to further strengthen the management and operational coordination of POWER GRID’s transmission network in the region. NERTS plays a key role in ensuring reliable and efficient power transmission across the North Eastern states.

Kumar joined POWERGRID in January 1994 and has more than 32 years of experience in the power transmission sector. He holds a B.Sc. Engineering degree in Electrical Engineering from B R Ambedkar Bihar University, Muzaffarpur, and was promoted to the position of Executive Director in July 2026.

During his tenure with POWERGRID, Kumar has served in various capacities across the North Eastern and Eastern regions, as well as at corporate and regional offices. His experience spans substation maintenance, operation and maintenance, consultancy, transmission line and substation projects, and project execution.

Kumar has also served at Jiribam and Seppa in the North Eastern Region, alongside assignments in Ranchi, Jamshedpur, Gurgaon, Rajasthan and other locations.

She emphasised that women’s capability and competence in the power and renewable energy sectors are well established. However, scaling their participation demands deliberate, system-level interventions and coordinated action across policymakers, utilities and industry stakeholders. Gupta underscored the importance of building enabling ecosystems that address structural barriers and create equal opportunities at all levels of the sector.

Her remarks reinforced the need to integrate gender-responsive practices into the core functioning of India’s power and renewable energy ecosystem. By embedding inclusion into organisational frameworks, operational processes and infrastructure planning, she noted, the sector can unlock broader talent pools while strengthening long-term sustainability and institutional resilience.

Other senior officials approved as Executive Directors include M. S. Hejib (SR-II), Kumud Wadhwa (ERP & IT), Harinarayanan Puthan Kalam (HR), Vikas Bagadia (CTUIL), Ashok Kumar Naik (ER-II), Rajesh V. (Khavda–Nagpur HVDC Project) and Arindam Chakraborty (Field Quality & Assurance). All the appointees bring more than three decades of rich experience in the power sector, with proven leadership across operations, technology, human resources, project execution and quality assurance.

In addition, Vineeta Agarwal, Chief Executive Officer of Powergrid Energy Services Ltd (PESL), and Akhilesh Kumar Dixit, Chief Executive Officer of Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL), will continue to serve on secondment. Their continued association will support POWERGRID’s expanding focus on emerging business areas such as smart grids, energy efficiency, renewable energy integration and digital transformation, reinforcing the organisation’s strategic growth objectives.