Ajay Banga, a prominent Indian-American businessman, has been chosen to run the World Bank for a five-year period. He is the first Indian-born candidate for president of the World Bank.
According to sources, he is scheduled to begin his new position in early June.
US President Joe Biden proposed the 63-year-old Banga for the position in late February. He was the sole candidate to succeed outgoing World Bank President David Malpass.
Banga has recently won over World Bank shareholders by establishing himself as a “true change maker” who will hasten the pace of the organization’s reforms. It has previously provided hundreds of billions of dollars in loans to developing nations, but it is working to boost this amount in order to aid those nations in addressing global issues like climate change.
Banga, a US citizen since 2007, is now vice chair of the private equity firm General Atlantic. He also holds the position of co-chair of the Partnership for Central America, where he collaborated closely with US Vice President Kamala Harris to mobilise resources for Northern Central America from the governmental, corporate, and nonprofit sectors.
He served as Mastercard’s former CEO. After 12 years as CEO of Mastercard Inc., where he set the goal of bringing 50 million micro- and small enterprises and 1 billion individuals into the digital economy by 2025, he announced his retirement in December 2021.
Biden singled out Banga’s background in mobilising public-private resources to address important concerns like climate change at a variety of organisations when making the selection.
Banga, who was born in Pune, graduated with a bachelor’s degree in economics from St. Stephen’s College in Delhi before pursuing an MBA at IIM Ahmedabad. He started his career with Nestle in India before moving on to work for Citigroup in Malaysia and India.
Banga has more than 30 years of commercial expertise and has held a number of positions at Mastercard as well as on the boards of Dow Inc., Kraft Foods, and the American Red Cross. After 12 years as CEO of Mastercard Inc., where he set the goal of bringing 50 million micro- and small enterprises and 1 billion individuals into the digital economy by 2025, he announced his retirement in December 2021.
When Banga became CEO of Mastercard, just after the 2008–2009 financial crisis, the payment processor’s income tripled as online shopping became more and more popular all over the world.
He is a founding trustee of the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum, a current member of the Trilateral Commission, a previous member of the National Committee on US-China Relations, and the Chairman Emeritus of the American India Foundation.
Banga, a co-founder of The Cyber Readiness Institute and vice chair of the Economic Club of New York, is the son of a general in the armed forces. He also served on President Barack Obama’s Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity. The US President’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations previously included him as a member.
The Indian President presented the Padma Shri Award to Banga in 2016. He was recognised as an Empower Ethnic Minority Role Model, awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honour, and listed by Harvard Business Review among the top 10 CEOs in the world for 2019. The Foreign Policy Association Medal was given to him in 2012, and in 2021 he received the Distinguished Friends of Singapore Public Service Star.
Banga also made Fortune’s list of the world’s top businesspeople and was given the Business Council for International Understanding’s Leadership Award.
2019’s ‘Global Indian of the Year’ was Ajay Banga, according to the Economic Times Awards for Corporate Excellence.
It may be mentioned here that the World Bank has been led by an American since its founding.
