HDFC Bank's board has cleared the appointment of Rajiv Kumar, a retired Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer and former Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) of India, as the lender's part-time non-executive chairman, bringing to a close a prolonged hunt for a permanent head of the board that followed the sudden departure of Atanu Chakraborty earlier this year.
At a meeting held on 29 June 2026, the board cleared Kumar's induction as an additional independent director for a four-year period, effective 30 June 2026. His subsequent elevation to part-time chairman, for a three-year term, still needs clearance from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), while his appointment as an independent director will separately require shareholder approval. Once RBI approval comes through, Mr Kumar will take charge as chairman from the date specified by the central bank.
Background to the Vacancy
The chairman's post had been lying vacant since Atanu Chakraborty stepped down abruptly on 18 March 2026. At the time, Mr Chakraborty pointed to certain internal practices at the Bank that he felt were not aligned with his personal values, though he did not elaborate publicly on specifics. Following his exit, veteran banker and independent director Keki Mistry took over as interim part-time chairman, initially for three months, with RBI later granting a further extension that took his tenure up to 18th September.
The Bank subsequently engaged two outside law firms, one based in the United States and the other in India, to conduct an independent review of the concerns mr Chakraborty had raised. That review reportedly concluded that his allegations could not be backed by documentary evidence or witness accounts.
In parallel, HDFC Bank's nomination and remuneration committee, working alongside executive search firm Egon Zehnder, spent months evaluating candidates for the top board post, with several prospective names falling through for various reasons before Mr Kumar's candidacy was finalised.
Kumar's Professional Background
Now 66, Mr Kumar belongs to the 1984 batch of IAS and retired as India's finance secretary in February 2020. He is best known for his role in cleaning up the balance sheets of public sector banks during his stint as secretary of the department of financial services between 2017 and 2020. That period saw the rollout of what came to be known as the '4R strategy,' covering recognition, resolution, recapitalisation, and reforms aimed at tackling stressed assets and restoring banking sector health.
Under his stewardship, the government infused over ₹3 lakh crore of fresh capital into public sector banks and consolidated 27 such banks into 12 larger, stronger entities. Regional rural banks were also reorganised under a one-state, one-regional rural bank (RRB) model during this phase. His tenure additionally saw deposit insurance cover raised from ₹1 lakh to ₹5 lakh, alongside tighter governance and risk-management frameworks across the banking sector.
According to HDFC Bank's profile of him, within roughly a fortnight of Mr Kumar joining the department of financial services, accounts belonging to about 338,000 shell companies were frozen as part of a crackdown on illicit money flows. This was followed by curbs on unregulated deposit schemes, culminating in the passage of the Banning of Unregulated Deposit Schemes Act in 2019.
The Bank's profile also credits him with mandating passport disclosures for borrowers availing loans of ₹50 crore and above, introducing fraud-detection mechanisms and bringing in technology-based risk scoring across more than 34 parameters for large exposures, measures intended to tighten oversight of big-ticket lending by large bank consortiums.
Election Commission Tenure
Beyond his finance ministry role, Mr Kumar also served as India's 25th Chief Election Commissioner, joining the Election Commission as a commissioner on 1 September 2020 and being elevated to the top post on 15 May 2022. In that capacity, he oversaw the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, in which roughly 642mn (million) electors took part, one of the largest electoral exercises conducted anywhere in the world.
During his tenure at the Election Commission, reforms introduced included four qualifying dates each year for voter registration, provisions allowing 17-year-olds to pre-register, delimitation work concerning Assam, and steps aimed at easing voting for polling officers themselves. He also faced criticism from some quarters over concerns about the commission's independence and perceived impartiality during this period.
In his farewell remarks, Mr Kumar flagged urban voter apathy as a continuing concern, despite outreach efforts, and called for greater priority to be placed on remote voting facilities for internal migrants and enabling non-resident Indians (NRIs) to vote, framing both as steps toward more inclusive electoral participation.
Mr Kumar has also previously served on the central board of RBI the financial stability and development council, the bank board bureau, and on the boards of the State Bank of India and the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), among other institutions. HDFC Bank has clarified that he is not related to any other director or key managerial personnel at the bank.
What Comes Next
With the chairman's appointment now settled, attention is expected to shift to the board's deliberation on extending the tenure of managing director (MD) and chief executive officer (CEO) Sashidhar Jagdishan, whose current term is due to end in October 2026. Reports have suggested the bank is likely to reappoint Mr Jagdishan for a third term, though that decision now awaits the board's formal consideration, once Mr Kumar formally takes charge.
