NEW DELHI: Indian pubcaster Doordarshan would have a new director-general as the transfer orders of the present incumbent, Dr SY Quraishi, has finally 
been received by the information and broadcasting (I&B) ministry.
Quraishi would be move on, with a promotion as additional secretary, from DD to the steel ministry. The new posting order is likely to reach Quraishi on Monday, 1 September - which may as well be his last day with the national broadcaster.
The development was confirmed by both the I&B ministry officials and Quraishi himself.
"I have had a great stay at DD and would like to thank the media for being fair to me, even though I've had some heated exchanges with journalists on the performance of DD," Quraishi told indiantelevision.com today evening in a parting message.
However, it is not immediately known who would succeed Quraishi, a full-fledged DG for Doordarshan after many years of ad-hocism.
As per a temporary arrangement, additional secretary (broadcasting) in the I&B ministry, Vijay Singh, may be given additional charge of DD as its DG --- a route that former bureaucrat and Star India CEO, R. Basu, took to the corporate world from government service.
However, sources close to Singh say that the bureaucrat is not keen of taking on additional responsibility of DD as its DG, though he is a member on the board of Prasar Bharati, the autonomous body that oversees the functioning of DD and All India Radio.
Another option could be to give the charge of DD DG to Prasar Bharati CEO KS Sarma. He is also reported to be unwilling to shoulder this additional burden as he also doubles up as the DG of AIR at present. However, Prasar Bharati, still surviving on grant-in-aid from the government, has formally started an official hunt for a person to be DG, AIR.
Though officials are mum on the exit of Quraishi from DD, it is said that I&B minister Ravi Shankar Prasad was not happy with him, especially over the issue of re-launch of DD News channel that is slated to be back on air early November, if not on 2 October, which also happens to be the birth anniversary of the 'Father of the Nation', Mahatma Gandhi.