New Delhi, April 27 — The Ministry of External Affairs announced on Monday that former Union minister Dinesh Trivedi has been appointed India’s next High Commissioner to Bangladesh. The 75-year-old leader is expected to take up the posting shortly, the ministry said.
Trivedi will succeed diplomat Pranay Verma, who is slated to move to Brussels as India’s ambassador to the European Union. The appointment comes amid growing engagement between New Delhi and Dhaka across multiple sectors.
A veteran parliamentarian and minister, Trivedi served as Railway Minister from 2011 to 2012 and as Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare from 2009 to 2011 in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s cabinet. He represented the Barrackpore Lok Sabha constituency from 2009 to 2019 as a member of the All India Trinamool Congress and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party in 2021.
Recent bilateral activity between India and Bangladesh has included intensified cooperation in media and broadcasting. On April 13, then-High Commissioner Pranay Verma held talks with Bangladesh’s Information and Broadcasting Minister Zahir Uddin Swapon to boost exchanges of media delegations and strengthen ties between media and broadcasting institutions. Discussions covered capacity-building initiatives under India’s ITEC programme, including plans for a specialised training course in India for women journalists from Bangladesh, and collaboration on film-related activities such as screenings, festivals, and technical support for production and post-production.
Verma reiterated India’s willingness to work with the Government and people of Bangladesh to deepen people-centric cooperation across domains based on mutual interest and benefit.
Separately, on April 8 Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri met Bangladesh Foreign Minister Khalilur Rahman in New Delhi to explore enhanced energy cooperation, following Rahman’s high-level discussions with External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar. Puri noted the strong representation from the Bangladeshi delegation during those talks.
The MEA did not provide a specific start date for Trivedi’s tenure, only that he would assume the responsibilities in the near future.
