Pankaj Vinayak Sharma, co-founded Transform Schools, an award-winning early stage not-for-profit organisation with proven impact. He leads the Transform team by providing strategic oversight and thought leadership to improve the quality of education in India, at scale. Pankaj has built the organisation ground up, with a strong board, advisors and a skilled leadership team. Transform works in four states of India along with arms in New Delhi and London and impacts 6.2 million children.
Pankaj has leadership and management experience of over two decades with international development organisations spanning Education, Health, HIV/AIDS, Livelihoods, Child Rights and Humanitarian Assistance sectors. He was the Country Head of Kusuma Foundation until December 2018. Post a shift in their strategy he started Transform Schools taking the core team and programmes forward, and is currently focused on driving secondary school readiness through tested accelerated learning models at scale. His leadership roles have been at CARE, Project Concern International, India, University of Manitoba & Karnataka Health Promotion Trust. Pankaj holds an Honours Degree and a Masters in Social Work from Delhi University & The Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai respectively and a Certificate in Health and Human Rights from University of Heidelberg, Germany
Pankaj is deeply committed towards realisation of child rights and education as means of achieving better life outcomes for Indians in this lifetime. He lives in Gurugram with a large joint family, loves music, reading and is a coffee aficionado.
Sanjeev Kumar Gupta is a finance and accounting professional with 22 years of successful experience in not-for-profit sector. He has been working with PCI since 2005 and has performed at various positions in finance & Accounting and is currently managing international assignments as a Regional Finance Specialist for Global Communities. He brings to his role a deep expertise in financial and accounts management to provide greater efficiency and value-added results. He holds B. Com from Delhi University, M.Com from Annamalai University, BCA from Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) and PGDIT from Symbiosis.
Indrajit is the CEO & Country Director for Project Concern International, India, having previously led the successful implementation of the flagship initiative of PCI, called JEEViKA Technical Support Program funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in the state of Bihar as the Chief of Party. The program was developed of a successful scalable model for integrating health and nutrition interventions in community platforms, and is currently being replicated by the community platforms across India.
Prior to PCI, Indrajit worked as Director – Monitoring Learning and Evaluation in CARE India where he established an innovative mechanism called “Concurrent Measurement and Learning”, and, also led the development of the first comprehensive mHealth application in India which was scaled nationally. Before CARE, Indrajit was associated with other organizations such as Save the Children and PRADAN, where he spent much time in remote tribal areas of India designing and implementing programs and conducting ethnographic studies with marginalized tribal communities.
Indrajit has done MBA in Forest Management from Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM), Bhopal. He is a management professional and a development thinker working for nearly two decades towards conceptualizing and leading multiple large development initiatives in various sectors in India and various other countries in South and South East Asia.
Pallavi Upadhyaya is a social sector professional turned social entrepreneur. She has combined her passion for social good and love for sustainable food systems guide her career path. She is the co-founder and Managing Director of Millets for Health, a D2C Millet Product Brand based in Delhi NCR. Millets for health has a range of 65 plus millet based products to suit every type of palate and is a one – stop millet shop. They have been working on the revival of millets since 2016 and are closely connected with a strong farmer base of 9000+ farmers.
The brand has a strong focus on on increased consumer awareness and retention through regular engagement with consumers through cooking demonstrations, millet cooking courses, e-learning course, millet based food & a diverse range of millet products.
Jerome is a strategic, growth-driven senior professional with extensive experience leading complex multi-sectoral programs and delivering sustainable impact in challenging environments. He has successfully turned around underperforming initiatives and optimised workforce performance through targeted coaching, mentorship, and process improvements. With leadership experience in 21 countries across Asia, Africa, MENA, Eastern Europe, and the Americas, Jerome has held key roles such as Proposal Director, Regional Director, Country Director, Program Quality Strategist, and Chief of Party. As an executive and life coach, he is passionate about empowering individuals and teams to thrive and drive meaningful change.
Arun is a member of General Body and Chairman of the Finance and Risk Management Committee (FARM) of Project Concern International, India.
Arun has worked internationally in both for-profit as well as not-for-profit sector in areas including financial operations, assurance, institutional capacity building, governance, enterprise risk management, fraud and legal compliance. Arun started his career with Coopers & Lybrand/PwC before moving on to the not-for-profit sector.
Arun is qualified Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India and Certified Practising Accountant from CPA Australia.
Mr. Anup Kumar Singh is one of the pioneers in India’s microfinance sector with more than 24 years of experience the Micro Finance Industry. He promoted Sonata Finance in 2006 to make microfinance self-sustainable and economically viable. Under his supervision and mentoring, Sonata has excellently executed its goals and created a strong, sustainable and value creating business while improvising the earning capacity of thousands of households.
Mr. Anup underwent training with Grameen Bank in Bangladesh and was associated for more than 8 years with the CASHPOR group of Companies. At the time of leaving CASHPOR, he was an ex-officio Chief Executive.
He holds a Masters degree in Economics & Sociology, a Postgraduate Diploma in Rural Development and Management, and an MBA in Finance.
Mr. Sandeep Sharma is associated with Financial Management Service Foundation since 2005 and is currently the Director-Programs. He provides strategic direction and leadership in the management of the organization. He is also responsible for the overall programs implemented by FMSF which also includes financial monitoring of more than 170 large development projects in South Asia.
Mr. Sandeep Sharma has been involved in several organizational development processes for various national and international organizations. He is a seasoned trainer and has facilitated more than 300 workshops across the globe.
He has also authored books on several topics and some of them include ‘FCRA & Lokpal for NPOS- 3 Edition-2017’. He is also the co-author and team member of a South Asian research and publication on “NPO Governance and law in South Asia”. He is also the author of “Handbook for Social Audit of NGOs’ and “Governance and Financial Management for NPOS”. He is also the co‐editor of a half yearly journal called “INTERface” which is a compilation of articles on NGO finance, governance and legal compliances in India and contributor of a monthly E‐communiqué called “Standard & Norms” which deals on financial and legal compliances concerning voluntary sector in South Asia.
Mr. Sharma is a visiting faculty at Birla Institute of Management Technology (BIMTECH)Greater NOIDA, India on Programme Monitoring and Evaluation. He is also the Faculty of different online learning programs run by FMSF.
