View source for Gurunath Venkatesh Bewoor

{{Short description|Indian civil servant}}
{{Infobox Officeholder
| honorific-prefix = Sir
| name = Gurunath Venkatesh Bewoor
| honorific-suffix =[[Order of the Indian Empire|KCIE]], [[Indian Civil Service|ICS]] 
| image         =Gurunath Venkatesh Bewoor 1989 stamp of India.jpg
| caption       = Gurunath Venkatesh Bewoor on a 1989 stamp of India
| imagesize = 
| order1 = Director-General of Posts and Telegraphs Department
| term_start1 = 1934
| term_end1 = 1941

| order2 = Member of the Executive Council of the Viceroy of India
| term_start2 = July 1946
| term_end2 = October 1947
| monarch2 = [[George VI of the United Kingdom]] 
| governor-general2 =[[Archibald Wavell, 1st Earl Wavell|The Viscount Wavell]]
| primeminister2 = 
| predecessor2 = 
| successor2 = 
|order3 = Managing Director of Air India and Air India International
| term_start3 = 1948
| term_end3 = 1950
| birth_date          = {{Birth date|df=yes|1888|11|20}}
| birth_place         =[[Bevoor]], [[Bijapur district, Karnataka|Bijapur district]], [[Bombay Presidency]] (now in [[Bagalkot district]], [[Karnataka]])
| death_date          ={{Death date and age|df=yes|1950|12|02|1888|11|20}}
| death_place         =
| nationality         = [[Indian citizenship]]
| party               =
| spouse              = Rukmini Bewoor
| relations           =
| children            = [[Gopal Gurunath Bewoor]]
| residence           =
| alma_mater          = [[Cambridge University]]
| occupation          = Administrator
| profession          = Civil servant
| signature           =
| website             =
| footnotes           =
}}

'''Sir Gurunath Venkatesh Bewoor''' [[Order of the Indian Empire|KCIE]], [[Indian Civil Service|ICS]] (20 November 1888 – 2 December 1950) was an Indian civil servant. He served on the [[Viceroy's Executive Council]] during the [[World War II]] and the first Indian director of the Post and Telegraph department of India. He later served as Managing Director of [[Air India]].

==Early life and education==

The family name comes from [[Bevoor]] village then part of [[Bijapur district, Karnataka|Bijapur district]] of the old [[Bombay Presidency]] and now in the [[Bagalkot]] district of northern [[Karnataka]].  Gurunath Bewoor was born there on 20 November 1888 in a [[Deshastha Brahmin|Deshastha Madhva Brahmin]] family.  He got his Bachelor of Arts degree from the Deccan College, Pune (then part of [[Bombay University]], and won the Dakshina Fellowship. His further education was [[Cambridge University]] following which he passed the [[Indian Civil Service (British India)|Indian Civil Service]] (ICS) entrance examination.

==Civil servant==

Bewoor joined the ICS in 1921 in the [[Central Provinces]] cadre. After a year of district service he was transferred to the Posts and Telegraphs Department in 1922. He served as Post Master General at Patna, Nagpur and Bombay. He was appointed a CIE in the [[1932 King's Birthday Honours]] List.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=33831 |date=31 May 1932 |page=3572 |supp=y |nolink=yes}}</ref> In 1934, he was appointed as the Director General of the Post and Telegraph Department of India; he was [[Knight Bachelor|knighted]] five years later,<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=34633 |date=6 June 1939 |page=3853 |supp=y |nolink=yes}}</ref> being officially invested as a Knight Bachelor on 20 June 1939 at [[Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi|Viceregal Lodge]], [[Shimla|Simla]], by the [[Governor-General of India|Viceroy of India]], [[Victor Hope, 2nd Marquess of Linlithgow|Lord Linlithgow]].

In 1941, he was appointed Secretary, Posts and Air Department.  Despite the pressures of World War II and the disruptions caused by the [[Quit India]] movement, Bewoor efficiently managed the communications infrastructure of Britain's Indian empire.  Bewoor, along with others such as [[C.D. Deshmukh]], [[N. R. Pillai]], [[Y. N. Sukthankar]], [[R. K. Nehru]], [[H. M. Patel]], [[S. Jagannathan]], was a member of the [[Finance and Commerce Pool]] (FCP),<ref>{{cite web |url= http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/article1753620.ece |title=Finance and Commerce Pool: An old-is-gold idea  |first=Sumit K. |last=Majumdar |work=[[The Hindu]]: Business Line |date=2 December 2006 |accessdate=19 June 2015}}</ref> an elite group of Indian administrators tasked with managing the economic, commercial, industrial and supply-related issues of the war in India.

In 1946 he reached the pinnacle of the British Raj as a member of the Viceroy's Executive Council under [[Archibald Wavell, 1st Earl Wavell|Lord Wavell]] and was appointed a KCIE ([[Knight Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire]]) in the [[1946 New Year Honours]] List.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=37407 |date=28 December 1945 |page=10 |nolink=yes}}</ref> 

Bewoor was the originator of a formula known as the "Bewoor Time Test" to judge the efficiency of postal work.  This was based on a report he authored for the postal department in 1929, similar to the [[time-and-motion studies]] of [[Frederick Winslow Taylor]].

==Aviation==

In 1944, he represented India at the [[International Civil Aviation Organization|ICAO Conference]] in Chicago.  He was also a member of the [[United Nations]] Transport and Communications Commission.

Sir Gurunath Bewoor died unexpectedly in December 1950.<ref>{{cite journal |url=http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1950/1950%20-%202084.html |title=Obituaries |issue=2185 |volume=LVIII |page=520 |journal=[[Flight International|Flight]] |date=7 December 1950 |accessdate=19 June 2015}}</ref>

His older son Madhav<ref>[http://www.defencedynamics.mod.uk/wewerethere/ww2/images/ioc_lg.jpg Image of Indian Officer Cadets Parkash Nanda and Madhav Gururao Bewoor at Sandhurst] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101208221216/http://www.defencedynamics.mod.uk/wewerethere/ww2/images/ioc_lg.jpg |date=8 December 2010 }}, Source: [https://web.archive.org/web/20100816160154/http://www.defencedynamics.mod.uk/wewerethere/ww2/india_2.html MOD “We Were There” exhibition].</ref> was a graduate of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and died during World War II.  His younger son [[Gopal Gurunath Bewoor]] was the [[Chief of the Army Staff (India)|Chief of the Army Staff]] from 1973 to 1975.

==References==

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Bewoor, Gurunath Venkatesh}}
[[Category:Knights Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire]]
[[Category:Indian Knights Bachelor]]
[[Category:Indian knights]]
[[Category:Indian Civil Service (British India) officers]]
[[Category:1888 births]]
[[Category:1950 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Bagalkot district]]
[[Category:Members of the Council of the Governor General of India]]