NEW DELHI: Former finance minister Pranab Mukherjee was appointed deputy chairman of the planning commission it was officially announced.
Mukherjee currently the spokesman of the AICC-I succeeds Mohan Dharia who tendered his resignation on Tuesday.
Mukherjee has held various important portfolios in the union cabinet in the seventies and early eighties.
It was during his stewardship as finance minister that India had initiated a policy dialogue with the international monetary fund (IMF) for structural adjustment loan of about four million SDR.
He succeeded in obtaining the jumbo loan in late 1981 to tide over the adverse balance of payment crisis caused by the second oil shock.
During the emergency period between 1975 and 1977 Mukherjee held the key portfolio of banking as minister of state.
Mukherjee was member of the Rajya Sabha in the early seventies from West Bengal. Subsequently he was elected to the upper house from Gujarat.
He was also president of the West Bengal Pradesh Congress-I committee
A trusted lieutenant of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi Mukherjee earned plaudits for his pioneering economic policies which were virtually a forerunner for the liberalisation of the Indian economy in the mid-eighties.
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