The decks have been cleared for the appointment of Vineet Joshi, 41, as the next Central Board of School Education (CBSE) chairman.

It is learnt that Joshi’s candidature has been finalised by the Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry and is likely to soon get the nod of the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC). The CBSE has been without a chairperson for over a year now and Joshi, who was serving as Secretary CBSE since 2004, was given additional charge as acting CBSE chairman in August 2008 when former chairman Ashok Ganguly completed an eight-year term and his request for another extension was turned down.

Joshi’ s appointment has come after the selection process for the CBSE top job was conducted for a third time in less than a year’s time. Joshi is considered the safest bet for the job owing to his good understanding and handling of the CBSE system.

A 1992-batch IAS officer, Joshi hails from Uttar Pradesh and comes from the Manipur-Tripura cadre. He is a BTech in mechanical engineering from IIT Kanpur. He was a frontrunner for the chairman’s position even though he has completed ten years on deputation at the Centre. Joshi has earlier served in the ministries of Culture, Youth Affairs and Sports and Women and Child Development.

Those who lost out in the race include V Anand, who was earlier in the HRD Ministry’s Higher Education division, and Poonam Agarwal from the NCERT.

The latest selection process was initiated in late 2008 under the former HRD minister Arjun Singh’s regime, with changes in the eligibility criteria, age bar of 58 and more academic than administrative experience to get younger candidates in the fray.