Nirupama Rao named director at Network 18

Former foreign secretary Nirupama Rao has been named non-executive independent director of media house Network 18, now a part of industrialist Mukesh Ambani's group.

In an intimation to stock exchanges, the company said Rao's appointment was taken up by the board of directors and approved Wednesday. The appointment satisfies the requirement under the Companies Act of having at least one woman director on the board of public limited companies.

The soft-spoken member of the Indian Foreign Service (1973 batch) was India's foreign secretary for two years from July 2009. She then served as India's ambassador to the US from August 2011 to November 2013. She also headed the Indian missions in Colombo and Beijing.

Rao, who was also the official spokesperson for the external affairs ministry, said she looked forward to the assignment: "Media and the brave, new and exciting world of communications in the public sphere has been a matter of deep and abiding interest to me."

Network 18 had inducted media veteran A.P. Parigi as group chief executive in January. Now, the board comprises former McKinsey India chairman Adil Zainulbhai, banker Deepak Parekh, corporate lawyer Rajiv Luthra, tech and media expert Vinay Chhajlani, entrepreneur Raghav Bahl, journalist Rohit Bansal and finance expert Dhruv Kaji.