India's former central bank governor appointed as AIIB vice president

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Urjit Patel, a former governor of Reserve Bank of India, will begin his three-year term as the vice president. investment operations for South Asia, the Pacific Islands and Southeast Asia at the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank on February 1, 2022. /AIIB

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has appointed former Indian central bank chief Urjit Patel as vice president, investment operations for South Asia, the Pacific Islands and Southeast Asia. Patel will start his term from February 1, replacing D. J. Pandian, who has held the post since the Beijing-headquartered multilateral bank started operations in 2016.

Patel will be one of five vice presidents – with a three-year term each – in AIIB's senior management team headed by President Jin Liqun of China, who started his second five-year term in January 2021.

"I am delighted to welcome Dr. Patel as the newest member of my management team," the AIIB president said in a statement announcing his appointment earlier this week. "His extensive experience at the national and international levels across various public and private sectors will help the bank better embrace its growth phase and will support AIIB's vision of investing in Infrastructure for Tomorrow," Jin added.

Patel served as the 24th governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) from September 2016 to December 2018, a crucial period when the South Asian country implemented a large-scale demonetization of high value banknotes. He resigned from his post before the scheduled end of his term in September 2019 reportedly due to some policy differences with the government, becoming the first governor to do so since 1990.

Patel is currently the chairman of the New Delhi-based National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, a leading think-tank on fiscal policy and tax matters. He was also the executive director and member of the management committee of the Chennai-headquartered Infrastructure Development Finance Company (IDFC) Ltd.

Patel has a PhD in economics from Yale University and has extensive experience in the infrastructure and energy sectors. He was the recipient of the Wilbur Cross Medal from Yale University in 2019 and has authored many scholarly publications and papers on public finance, infrastructure, regulatory economics, monetary policy, the global financial safety net, the economics of climate change and the theory of international trade.

Pandian leaves a legacy

Patel's predecessor Pandian is widely seen as one of the key architects of AIIB who also served as the bank's first chief investment officer since its foundation. A former Indian bureaucrat, Pandian was instrumental in getting finance proposals for projects worth $17.8 billion in 14 member countries approved by AIIB's board of directors in the past six years.

D. J. Pandian, the current AIIB vice president, investment operations for South Asia, the Pacific Islands and Southeast Asia, during an interview with CGTN Digital at AIIB Headquarters, Beijing, October 26, 2021. /CGTN

"D. J.'s contributions to the bank, particularly his role in building the Investment Operations team, have been crucial to our operations," Jin said in bidding farewell to the outgoing vice president. "His experience in infrastructure development helped AIIB build capacity in end-to-end project identification to implementation, which was critical particularly in our start-up years. We thank him for his work and for helping the bank grow to where it is now."

In an exclusive interview with CGTN Digital last October, Pandian had highlighted the AIIB's main objectives as bridging the infrastructure gap in Asia and lending a helping hand in the global economic recovery from the pandemic.

He also dispelled the misconception pushed by a section of the international media that describes AIIB as a Chinese or China-led bank, stressing that the bank's multilateralism is its strength and needs to be highlighted. "We are China-based, but we are an international bank with a multilateral approach. We have members across all continents," he stressed. In late December, Iraq joined as the 105th member of the bank.

In the past six years, AIIB has made a mark as the youngest multilateral bank leading infrastructure project financing in Asia and other parts of the world by approving close to 150 projects in over 31 countries valued at nearly $30 billion. India, the second largest shareholder behind China, has emerged as AIIB's largest beneficiary. The bank has approved 29 projects worth more than $6.7 billion in the South Asian country so far.

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