India’s IT Secretary has been appointed to a high-level UN Internet panel

By Arul LouiUnited Nations, Aug 16 : UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday appointed Indias Electronics and Information Technology Secretary Alkesh Kumar Sharma to a group of prominent experts on internet governance.

Internet pioneer Vint Cerf and Nobel Prize-winning journalist Maria Reesa were also appointed to the 10-member Internet Governance Forum (IGF) Leadership Panel, Guterress spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters.

Additionally, Guterres envoy on technology, Amandeep Singh Gill, will also be on the panel.The panel was established pursuant to the guidelines of the IGF and the recommendations in Guterress Roadmap for Digital Cooperation.

The panels mission is to take on the task of dealing with "strategic and urgent problems" of the Internet and offer strategic guidance to the IGF.Sharma is an Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer in the Kerala cadre.An ex-secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, he was also associated with the UN Development Programme as the national director of projects in charge of Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation.

Former diplomat Gill was Indias representative permanent at the UN Conference on Disarmament and was the chief executive officer of the International Digital Health and Artificial Intelligence Research Collaborative (I-DAIR).Cerf is often referred to as "the father of the internet" because he was one of the original creators of the internets architecture as well as the TCP/IP standard, which are standards that allow devices and programs to communicate via digital networks.

Reesa an American-Finnish journalist who was detained in her home country, the Philippines was awarded the Nobel Prize in recognition of her "efforts to protect the freedom of freedom of expression".(Arul Louis may be reached via aru.l@ians.in and can be followed on Twitter at @arulouis.) al/ar.