New Delhi, Feb. 6: The HRD ministry has appointed D.. Tripathi, retired ancient historian from Gorakhpur University, as chairperson of the Indian Council of Historical Research, reports our special correspondent.

His predecessor M.G.S. Narayanan was removed from his post following a number of run-ins with the ministry.

Narayanan had accused HRD minister Murli Manohar Joshi of packing the educational institutions with “his people.”

Tripathi has earlier been a member of the council’s executive body. Some academics say he was little known till he entered the limelight with his work on the Saraswati river project. The discovery of the river - a controversial subject - has been a favourite theme of academics close to the Sangh Parivar.

Tripathi was a member of the three-man committee set up by former NCERT director J.S. Rajput to look into the “misdeeds” of Left historian Arjun Dev, who headed the NCERT’s history department till he retired.

Some consider Tripathi to be “much closer to the Sangh Parivar than Narayanan (was)”.