Participants, Speakers and Panelists
Brijesh is the Co-founder and director at IndiaMART - India’s largest B2B marketplace. IndiaMART has stood of test of time to emerge as one of the few profitable & and publicly listed internet businesses in India. He was featured by Fortune India in its “40 Under 40” list. Apart from being an entrepreneur, he is passionate about education, where he loves to spend his time. He is one of the founders and trustees of Plaksha University
Dr. Monimalika Day is an Associate Professor at the School of Education Studies (SES), at Dr. B. R Ambedkar University Delhi (AUD). She completed her Ph.D. from the University of Maryland at College Park, USA. She has been involved in several research projects to improve developmental outcomes of young children from marginalised communities, through parenting programmes and preschool education. She has provided technical assistance to various states in India through the Center for Early Childhood Education and Development and has supervised research projects. Prior to this she was an Assistant Professor at George Mason University and her research focused on preparing teachers to engage with children and families from diverse communities. She has provided training and technical assistance to various early childhood programmes in the USA during her work with the Center for Programme Excellence at Zero To Three.Her research interests focus on early stimulation, quality of early childhood programmes, preschool education, inclusion of children with disabilities, teacher education and collaboration between schools and families. She has authored two books, and several chapters and has published in peer-reviewed journals.
Garima has 11 years of diverse experience working in corporate, government, and social sectors in both global and domestic capacities. At Max India Foundation she supports the foundation activities in multiple roles and also leads relationships with the partner not-for-profit organizations. Prior to her role at Max India, Garima was leading the Organisational Development and Culture vertical at Simple Education Foundation and also comes with 2 years of teaching experience in low-income government private schools as a Teach for India fellow. Getting inspired by her children and understanding the importance of play in daily life, she co-founded the Khel Khel Mein Foundation, working in the space of Sports for Development. She is also an alumnus of Ernst and Young and Thinkthrough Consulting. Garima holds a Bachelor of Commerce Degree and is an Associate Member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.
Archana Kannan Iyer is the Chief operating officer at Indus Action. She is compelled by the idea that systems need to work in service of the most marginalised. She graduated with an M.A from the Institute of Education at UCL and having spent most of her career thinking about children’s learning, she is convinced that thinking critically about the ethics of care, gender relations and children’s well-being has wider applicability to shift existing social structures to being more just and equal.
Deepika Mogilishetty is Chief of Policy and Partnerships and part of the leadership team at EkStep Foundation. She is a lawyer and a graduate of NLSIU, Bangalore with experience of working on human rights and women's rights issues, she is driven by enabling access to rights by leveraging policy, technology and understanding mindsets. She has for 10+ years worked on issues at the intersection of policy, technology and access and societal change – particularly on large-scale societal challenges that address issues of equity in the areas such as identity and education.
With extensive experience of working with children, adolescents and youth from low-income backgrounds, Ravi Gulati has been building and nurturing an extraordinary learning community of across-age learners through Manzil - a non-profit he co-founded with his mother and her friend 25 years ago. Manzil’s uniqueness lies in that it is led and managed by a 10-member full-time manzillion-alumni team supported by about 30 manzillion-teachers addressing the learning needs of about 400 young people. Manzil has directly touched the lives of over 20,000 young people, many of whom have over the years set up a number of social entrepreneurial and intrapreneurial initiatives that ripple out to many more, setting up a domino effect - a chain reaction of social incubations. Beyond Manzil, Ravi is engaged with many youth who are passionately working on a gamut of social issues. He also co-founded 3 other non-profits – ComMutiny-The Youth Collective, Safe in India Foundation working on safety in auto manufacturing, and Creatnet Education, through which he has been facilitating the learning and development of 1000+ Delhi Government School Principals for effective school leadership to influence the learning context of children getting public education. When not engaging in social change, Ravi enjoys reading as his ‘me time’ and singing with his toddler daughter.
Bharath Bevinahally is one of the founders and CEO of Kutuki. At Kutuki, over the past 4 years, his team has married art, technology and pedagogy to create a comprehensive early learning platform tailored to address foundational learning for Indian children and their work has impacted over 5 million children across 2500 locations in India. The Kutuki platform is also much loved by parents and teachers alike for the simplicity of the content and the Indianness of the characters and stories. He is a graduate of the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad where he was a recipient of the ISB Torchbearer’s Award. He has previously worked in consulting and general management in IT Services, and Media and Entertainment. He is a trained Carnatic classical musician, guitarist and music composer
Devyani is a Senior Consultant at Probex Management Consulting. Probex has been offering consulting services in the areas of research, as well as monitoring and evaluation (M&E), since 2010. These services include developing M&E frameworks, conducting third-party evaluations, and building evaluation capacity and culture. While we possess both quantitative and qualitative research capabilities, we are particularly skilled at the latter. Our clients include EkStep Foundation, for whom we interviewed 152 fathers in 3 phases, and Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies, for whom our sample size exceeded 160 across 6 qualitative studies, as well as a synthesis report. Devyani possesses a B.A. from Wesleyan University in the U.S. and a M.Sc.Pl. from the University of Toronto in Canada.
Darshana has been associated with Saajha for almost 7 years now. She is currently supporting parents as a Saajhedar and was earlier an SMC member and had also started her own preschool. She enjoys cooking, playing badminton, cycle rides and spending time with her family.
Shailendra is a Sales Manager at Frost Time Ice Cream. Beyond the workplace, Shailendra finds joy in spending quality time with his family during holidays. Whether it's watching TV or engaging in friendly games, he values these moments immensely. His interests also extend to movies and dance, serving as his favourite forms of relaxation and inspiration. Shailendra has a profound affection for children, stemming from his own experiences as a child and as a loving father. He firmly believes in the importance of being a supportive, consistent, and involved parent. He understands that parenthood is a blessing and a responsibility to guide children in the right direction, even when it requires setting firm boundaries.
Mrinalini R. Jha is the CSR Lead at the Straive Group, one of the corporate collaborators for Saajha. She completed her post-graduation in Social Work from Tata Insititute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. As a young professional, she started working with the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) and then moved to the Straive group, looking after their social impact projects and programs. Straive, in its course of business, is equally committed to its ESG Goals, and it holds a strong belief in giving back to the community they are operating out of. For the same, they have several social undertakings in areas pertaining to Education, Environment, Health and Wellbeing, and Upliftment of women and children in cities like Chennai, Trichy, Pondicherry, Noida, and Kolkata in India.