Mr. Sinha has a B.Tech. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur (1973) and PGDBM from the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Bangalore, with specialisation in Finance (1977). He has been conferred the Distinguished Alumnus Award from both IIT Kanpur and IIM Bangalore. He has been conferred with the India Chief Financial Officer Award 2001 for Information and Knowledge Management by the Economic Intelligence Unit (EIU) India and American Express. He received an award from TMG (Technology Media Group) for Customer Management.

He has a wealth of experience, competencies and expertise from his leadership journey as the Chairman and Managing Director of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. (BPCL), which is present across the entire value chain with activities covering exploration and production, refining and marketing oil and gas products. He spent 33 years in BPCL, where he served on the Board of BPCL for 15 years first as Director (Finance) for 10 years from 1996 and then as its Chairman and Managing Director for 5 years from August 2005.

Since 2011, he has served on the Boards of Petronet LNG Ltd., CMC Ltd. (erstwhile subsidiary of Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.), four subsidiaries of Vodafone India Ltd., Tata Advanced Systems Ltd., Tata Lockheed Martin Aerostructures, and Nova Integrated Systems. Currently, he is an independent director on the board of Cipla Ltd., Axis Asset Management Co., You Broadband and Air Asia India Ltd.