Guruprasad Mohapatra, a senior bureaucrat known for his administrative acumen who succumbed to COVID-19 last year, was conferred with Padma Shri on Tuesday. His family, colleagues and friends recall how despite his own illness in April, 2021, the then Secretary of Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) continued to work on distribution of oxygen when the pandemic was at its most dreadful and deaths from the disease were at their peak in the country. Guruprasad Mohapatra breathed his last exactly two months later, on June 19,2021, following post-COVID-19 complications.
His colleagues credit him for his role during the first wave when he along with colleagues Ravi Capoor, the then Secretary of Textiles Ministry, and P.D. Vaghela, the then Secretary of Pharmaceuticals, who headed the Empowered Group on medical equipment, was instrumental in turning the country into an exporter of PPE kits, masks and ventilators from being an importer of these items.
Jimut Baran, the younger of two sons, sums up his father’s legacy best, “the civil servant in him is now etched in eternity with the Padma Shri. But more than his official side, what is most important is that he was a great human being who touched many lives, which will live on.”
