R Sunder Rajan, the former chief of legal at GMR, has joined Bharti Airtel as its group general counsel (GC), reported The Times of India.

The telecoms giant had been seeking someone for the role for nine months, with Rajan joining at the beginning of this month, heading secretarial, compliance and legal, including corporate transactions, according to the Times. Rajan began his career at the Madras high court.

Rajan replaces the company’s former group general counsel Mukesh Bhavnani, who had been at Bharti since 2011 but had joined mining company Vedanta earlier this year.

Bhavnani has since resigned from Vedanta for personal reasons, the Economic Times reported yesterday.

Bhavnani told ET that he would relocate to the US where his son lives, and that he might start his own policy advocacy and regulatory litigation firm afterwards.

Photo by Shrutuja Shirke / CC.