Sunil Arora — the BJP’s man or no-nonsense bureaucrat?

In 2014, almost a decade after he was shunted back to his home cadre of Rajasthan, bureaucrat Sunil Arora returned to Central service.

A former Chairman and Managing Director of Indian Airlines (IA), and a Secretary in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Arora was made Secretary in the Ministry of Skill Development.

On Thursday, the 1980 batch IAS officer was named Election Commissioner.

Arora’s career has blossomed under the BJP-led NDA governments of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi and his appointment to the poll panel is being seen as a smart move: he is likely to be Chief Election Commissioner during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

However, many who have worked with Arora insist that he is no pushover, and is more than capable of dealing with the political pressures that could come his way.

“If the BJP thinks that by appointing Arora they have their own man at the helm of the Election Commission during the 2019 general elections, they could be in a for a surprise,” said a retired bureaucrat who has worked with Arora.

Another retired officer recalls how Arora, at the helm of IA, stood up to political pressure. “I have seen Arora firmly tell Shahnawaz Husain and Rajiv Pratap Rudy that, being Ministers of Civil Aviation, they were free to dictate and change policy. But they should not try and micro-manage the running of IA,” he added. In fact, the rumours at the time — when the UPA government under Manmohan Singh took office — was that Praful Patel, who became the Civil Aviation Minister, had been warned about Arora.

His no-nonsense attitude perhaps explains how, despite differences of opinion between Rudy and Arora during Prime Minister Vajpayee’s tenure, Arora was able to return, as Secretary in his Ministry of Skill Development.

A former IA employee recalls how Arora, a stickler for rules, backed him in his attempts to bring discipline into the carrier. “The unions were up in arms about being asked to report on time. Waiting for his flight, Arora summoned me. He asked me what the issue was and after hearing me out, he asked me to continue doing what I was doing. A short while later, the union leaders approached him. He sternly advised them to follow company policies.”

However, not all IA employees have been happy with Arora. Some say he believed in creating coteries, and would believe anything a member of that group would tell him.

A former IA employee who faced his wrath recalls that during the Durga Puja festival, Arora was in Kolkata inspecting cleanliness in various departments. He did not like what he saw and summoned the department’s chief, who was on leave. Given the chaos on the roads, the official’s arrival was delayed, angering Arora so much that he shouted, “Does she have mehendi on her feet that it is taking her so long to report?”

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