WhatsApp India head Abhijit Bose and Rajiv Aggarwal, Director Public Policy Meta India have resigned on Tuesday.
Shivnath Thukral, the director of public policy at WhatsApp will has now been appointed by Meta to head the public policy initiatives of the company across all the three platforms- WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram, the company said.
This comes days after Meta India head Ajit Mohan quit the company to join Snap Inc.
Bose was appointed as the first country head for WhatsApp in any country in 2018. He was roped in to drive Whatsapp's payments business as well as expand the messaging app's reach in India.
Bose was previously the cofounder of payments firm Ezetap before joining WhatApp as its India head.
While Thukral has been given the additional responsibility, it is unclear as of now as to who will replace Bose.
"It's been 4 years from since I joined as WhatsApp's first Country Head in India, and I'm so proud of what we have built. I'm also really excited about my next gig. I believe that the next 5 years will be transformational for India -- with many of our current pre-IPO companies very quickly becoming the global leaders in their respective sectors. After a small break, I plan to rejoin the entrepreneurial world; you’ll see announcements on that shortly!," Bose said in a Linkedin post.
"I want to thank Abhijit Bose for his tremendous contributions as our first Head of WhatsApp in India. His entrepreneurial drive helped our team deliver new services that have benefited millions of people and businesses. There is so much more WhatsApp can do for India and we’re excited to continue helping advance India’s digital transformation,” said Will Cathcart, head of WhatsApp.
While Abhijit will be exiting the company towards the end of this week after serving his notice period, Aggarwal will be serving his notice period over the next few days.
Last week, Meta announced that it is sacking around 11,000 employees globally as a cost-cutting measure.
Rajiv Aggarwal has decided to step down to pursue another opportunity, the company said.
“Over the last year, he has played an important role in leading our policy-led initiatives in areas such as user-safety, privacy and scaling up programmes like GOAL to drive digital inclusion in the country. He has also been leading proactive engagement with critical policy and regulatory stakeholders,” the company said.
