 "Hardeep Singh Puri, Hardeep Singh, Hardeep")
Hardeep Singh Puri has been retained as petroleum and natural gas minister in the third term of the Narendra Modi government.
A former diplomat, Puri’s exposure to geopolitics and the global energy space are widely believed to have worked in his favour.
A 1974 batch Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer, Puri served as the permanent representative of India to the United Nations from 2009 to 2013.
Previously, he had been chairman of the United Nations Security Council Counter-Terrorism Committee, president of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), secretary-general of the Independent Commission on Multilateralism in New York, and vice-president of the International Peace Institute.
Puri had also helmed the civil aviation, and housing & urban affairs ministries, and served as the minister of state for commerce and industry in the second term of the Modi government.
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Beginning his career as a lecturer of history at St Stephen's College in 1973, Puri joined the Indian Foreign Service the following year.
During his career as a diplomat, Puri held important posts in Brazil, Japan, Sri Lanka, and the United Kingdom.
Between 1988 and 1991, he was the coordinator of the UNDP/UNCTAD Multilateral Trade Negotiations Project to help developing countries in the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations.
He was also a joint secretary in the ministry of defence from 1997 to 1999, heading the Defence Planning and Coordination division responsible for Army-Air Force-Navy cooperation. He was the first IFS officer to do so.
From 2009 to 2013, Puri was the permanent representative of India to the United Nations.
He also served the International Peace Institute as a senior advisor in June 2013.
Assuming charge as the petroleum minister in 2021, Puri was instrumental in cutting red tape and expediting measures to make oil and gas exploration easier for companies. This effort was made in a bid to achieve the target of 1 million square km under exploration by 2030.
In his second stint, Puri will have to guide the oil and gas sector towards the larger goal of adopting cleaner fuels, especially through initiatives aimed at expanding biogas and green hydrogen production.
