IFCI chairman KD Agarwal said that the board in its meeting on Monday had ratified the name of Narasimham for the top post. He will replace Agarwal, who relinquishes office on Wednesday.

Narasimham was likely to assume charge after completion of certain formalities and issuance of necessary notification by the government. He will have to be coopted on the IFCI board before taking over as the chairman.

Narasimham's name was finalised by the nomination committee which was formed to select an ideal candidate to replace Agarwal. The committee, comprising IDBI chairman GP Gupta, LIC chairman G Krishnamurthy and joint secretary, banking division, AK Jain, considered a host of names for the post and the choice ultimately narrowed down to Narasimham and IFCI executive director Tapan Ganguly. Finally,of the two, the committee decided to forward Narasimham's name to the IFCI board.

Among those considered by the committee was Punjab National Bank chairman Rashid Jilani. His name was, however, dropped because of some vigilance cases against him.

According to sources present at the board meeting, the issue of making Ganguly joint managing director of the IFCI was not discussed. Earlier, it was being speculated that Ganguly might be made the joint managing director as there was some opposition within IFCI over opting an outsider, and that too from the IDBI.

For long IFCI has been wanting to get rid of the IDBI yoke and the same found expression in the board meeting too. IDBI holds 28 per cent stake in IFCI and considers it as part of the larger family.