Meet Balesh Sharma, who will be the CEO of Vodafone-Idea merged entity

Sharma, who joined Vodafone (then Hutch) in 2003, has over the years held several senior management positions in India and internationally

United Kingdom-based Vodafone Group and Aditya Birla Group have appointed Balesh Sharma as the chief executive officer (CEO) of the merged entity to be created as the local units of the two telecom majors come together for the India market. The appointment of Sharma has not come as a surprise to Vodafone employees, who have seen him taking control of the day-to-day functions of the company over the past year as its chief operating officer (COO).

According to several employees of the company, over the past year or so, Sharma was the man responsible for running the company, with Vodafone