Prof. Dinesh Awasthi

Prof. Dinesh Awasthi, an Economist by training, is Former Director, Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDI), Ahmedabad. He was a Professor of Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship at the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, before joining EDI as Director. Currently, He is a Visiting Professor at Sardar Patel Institute of Economic and Social Research, Ahmedabad and Advisor. Society for Research and Initiatives for Sustainable Technologies and Institutions, Ahmedabad.

Prof. Awasthi has over 60 research papers and eight books, besides a number of research studies, to his credit. He teaches entrepreneurship, strategic management and fundamentals of social Entrepreneurship. Areas of his professional interest include evaluation studies, development and growth of micro, small and medium enterprise (SMEs), cluster development, social entrepreneurship, strategies for poverty alleviation and employment creation and non-government organizations.

Prof. Awasthi was a Member of several Working Groups set up by Government of India for various 5-year Plans and Working Group on Growth Poles, National Commission on Informal/Unorganized Sector Enterprises, Government of India. Currently, he is a Chairman of Natioanl Advisory Committee on New gen IEDCs; and, Member of the National Advisory Committee on Incubation and Innovations, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India,. Besides these, he is Member of a number of Governing Boards of social ventures and PRAYAS, a Non-Banking Finance Organization and NIDI, A Sri Lanka based Development Organization.

Dr. Awasthi has also worked as a consultant to several UN agencies like ILO, UNIDO, UNDP and other international bodies like WS Atkins, UK and DFID, UK. He has extensively travelled across the globe in connection with various professional assignments.

Dr. C Shambu Prasad

Dr. C Shambu Prasad is a Professor of General Management (Strategy and Policy) at the Institute of Rural ManagementAnand(IRMA). At IRMA he coordinates the Centre for Social Entrepreneurship and Enterprises (CSEE) and the Verghese Kurien Centre of Excellence (VKCOE). He has been involved in promoting social entrepreneurship and instrumental in setting up IRMA’s incubator, ISEED (Incubator for Social Enterprises and Entrepreneurs for Development).His expertise is in science and innovation policy and his education has been multidisciplinary with a basic training in mechanical engineering, a Masters in Industrial Management with specialisation in science policy (both at IIT Madras) and a doctorate in science, technology and society studies from IIT Delhi.

Dr Shambu Prasad was awarded the Villgro-CSIE award for ‘Academic Contribution to the Field of Social Entrepreneurship’ in April 2013 and was the Fulbright Nehru Senior Research Fellow attached to Cornell University pursuing a long term study on the System of Rice Intensification or SRI. His research interests are in in understanding innovation at the margins, managing sustainable transitions and the sociology and politics of knowledge. His work seeks to create innovation spaces and learning alliances to foster knowledge dialogues between practitioners, academics and policy makers.This has included coordinating a consortium of institutions (Livelihoods MANTHAN) to work on rural livelihoods and an ongoing, decade-long engagement with understanding social innovations that enable sustainable transitions through the example of the System of Rice Intensification or SRI. He has been a member of a Sub Group on Upscaling Innovative Technologies in agriculture for the 12th Five Year Plan.

He has taught courses on social entrepreneurship, managing collectives, ecosystem and sustainability management, public policies and public systems management, innovation management and rural livelihoods.

Dr. Ajit Kanitkar

Ajit Kanitkar is currently a Consultant for Tata Education and Development Trust and a Member of the research team at Vikasanvesh Foundation (Centre for Development Research) in Pune. He completed his Ph. D from Pune University in 2001. He was Programme Officer at the Ford Foundation, India office, and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, both in New Delhi. He also taught at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA) during 1992-1995. He has authored three books and several research papers in professional journals. He is keenly interested in the developmental issues of the north eastern region and has travelled to all the states in the region several times during his professional career of last 25 plus years.

Ms. Meghali Senapati

MeghaliSenapati is an Associate Professor, TISS Guwahati Campus and Dean – Administration,Centre for Counselling, School of Social Work – TISS Guwahati Campus.

Meghali began her career as a social worker in a community based organisation in Chirang district of Assam. She works on women rights, community organisation, capacity building of grassroots development practitioners and feminist counseling. She is currently assistant professor in the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Guwahati.

Mr. Ajay Muttreja

Ajay has 35 years of management experience in India-entry strategy consulting, cross-border public and private sector partnership development, business transformation and complex technology transfers. His strong understanding of global business practices combined with deep knowledge of the Indian regulatory landscape has enabled him to help more than 1,000 multi-national and Indian companies achieve transformational growth and long-term success in India. He has vast experience in every major sector and functional area, with a specialization in technology, healthcare, consumer goods, energy and. manufacturing.

Currently, Ajay works as a strategic advisor and mentor to several Indian startups (Aakar Innovations, Kritikal Solutions, Accuster Technologies and Swasti Agro Products), helping them to scale their businesses and develop global partnerships.

He serves as a jury member of and an advisor to prestigious forums, incubation programs and startup organizations, including Startup India, Millennium Alliance Social Innovation Awards, Plugin (IIT Mumbai + Intel), IC2 (University of Texas, Austin), FICCI and iHub. He was recently invited to speak at global conferences organized by the Government of India, such as the India International Science Forum and Asia Science Park Conference. He also sits on the advisory and board of Indian operations of several global companies.

In 29 years at Tecnova India, Ajay transformed the company from one that sold French technologies in India to one of the leading India-entry strategy consulting companies. He was part of 2,500+ global client engagements, providing end-to-end solutions, spanning consulting, advisory, incubation, partnership and implementation. He managed relationships with over 1,000 global companies and 2,000+ CXOs from US, Europe and Japan. Ajay also established and led the executive search firm Boyden’s franchise operations in Delhi, launched a startup incubator in association with Wharton Business School and State of Pennsylvania, and pioneered Tecnova’s expansion into the North America and Europe. In the span of one year as CEO, Ajay turned the company around, brought it back to profitability and established a culture of talent excellence and leadership development.

Prior to Tecnova, Ajay was the Industrial Advisor to the Royal Kingdom of Bhutan for over 2 years. During that time, he worked closely with the Minster of Trade, Industry and Mines to draft Bhutan’s first Industrial Policy. He also led negotiations to secure more than US$ 250 Million funds from UNIDO, World Bank and CDC for new Industrial & Mining projects in addition to serving as the Alternate Director to the Chairman on 17 joint-sector projects. Ajay also spent over 4 years as the Executive of Packaging Machinery at Metal Box, where he was responsible for launching high-value global turnkey contracts in India and USSR.

Ajay holds an MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and a B.Tech in Mechanical Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur.

Ms. Nirjumoni Dutta Bharali

Ms. Nirjumoni Dutta Bharali is the Program Director at ICCo. She comes with more than 26 years of work experience and extensive knowledge of working with the National Mahila Samakhya Program, Assam chapter, Government of India. She has expertise in the areas of holistic empowerment of rural marginalized women, life skill education for adolescents, child rights and protection, institution building of women and rights, livelihood promotion, thrift, credit and proposal development, policy influencing, working with the small farmers, especially women farmers and helping them to develop their social enterprise; Nutrition security for women and child.

She received the innovation challenge award in 2018 jointly organized by the United Nations World Food Program (UNWFP) and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) for her initiative at ICCo to create and design a women-led movement on Nutrition. She was chosen as the Resource group member of PRI-CBO convergence ASRLM. She was also chosen as the Resource member by the Assam government under Social Welfare Department for conducting training for the police department of Assam on Child marriage, trafficking, etc.

She started her journey in the development sector from Majuli Island while doing homestay at Mishing village. She holds a post-Graduate degree in Sociology, Post-Graduate Diploma in Human Resource Management, and Social Welfare & Labour Welfare, and Diploma in Business Administration.

Mr. Alay Barah

Mr. Alay Barah is the Executive Director of ICCo India. He leads the strategy and planning component along with overseeing the effective implementation of the organization’s initiatives.Prior to joining ICCo, Mr. Barah was the CEO of Reach India. With 3 decades of experience in the government and the non-profit sector, he has his expertise in strategic planning, social enterprise development, livelihood, microfinance health,agri-value chain development, participatory monitoring and evaluation and human resource development. Alay brings in inimitable skills in entrepreneurship and leadership, having worked with organizations such as Freedom from Hunger USA as Country Director, American India Foundation as Director of Livelihoods Programs, and Rashtriya Gramin Vikas Nidhi as Director of Operations.

Mr. Barah has masterminded the concept of Center of Excellence for Agriculture & Agri-allied Enterprises at Guwahati to promote and facilitate the farmer communities and to bring a green revolution through the COE.

Alay holds a master’s degree in Social Work from Tata Institute of Social Science, Mumbai. He has served as Senior Fellow at The Institute of Policy Studies, John Hopkins University, in 2001 under its International Philanthropy Fellows Program. He was also awarded a Ford Motor Company International Fellowship in 2010 as a community leader.

Ashok M V

Mr Ashok MV was working as CGM, NABARD till 31st of August.2017. Mr.M.V.Ashok is a Post Graduate in Agriculture from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) New Delhi after a Bachelor’s degree in Agriculture from the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University Coimbatore. He has additional qualifications in General Management from IGNOU, Human resources Development from Wellingkars Institute of Management, Mumbai and Training & Development from the Indian Society of Training & Development New Delhi. He has also done a Certificate course on Financing Micro Enterprises from the Institute of Development Studies, University of Reading, UK.

With a career in development banking spanning 34 years, since 1980, beginning as an Agricultural Officer with Canara Bank, a leading commercial bank in India for two years, then as a Banking Officer with RBI in 1982 for a year before his services having been transferred to NABARD in 1983 on voluntary option.

Mr. Ashok has experience in rural management and rural development projects. He has headed two state Regional Offices of NABARD at Jharkhand and Maharashtra States. He has serviced in various other capacities in the States of Kerala, Tamil Nadu,UP and the Head Office. He has also served as a District Development Manager in Kannur district of Kerala state and as a Faculty Member of the Bankers Institute for Rural Development Lucknow. Mr. Ashok has ample experience in designing and implementing sustainable development programmes for rural communities and has associated himself with several corporates in choosing appropriate development programs using CSR funds and in helping choose implementing partners like NGOs

Mr. Ashok has had exposure of rural finance sector in several countries including Thailand, Kenya, China, Germany and England.

Alay Barah

Executive Director

Mr. Alay Barah is the Executive Director of ICCo India. He leads the strategy and planning component along with overseeing the effective implementation of the organization’s initiatives.Prior to joining ICCo, Mr. Barah was the CEO of Reach India. With 3 decades of experience in the government and the non-profit sector, he has his expertise in strategic planning, social enterprise development, livelihood, microfinance health,agri-value chain development, participatory monitoring and evaluation and human resource development. Alay brings in inimitable skills in entrepreneurship and leadership, having worked with organizations such as Freedom from Hunger USA as Country Director, American India Foundation as Director of Livelihoods Programs, and Rashtriya Gramin Vikas Nidhi as Director of Operations.

Mr. Barah has masterminded the concept of Center of Excellence for Agriculture & Agri-allied Enterprises at Guwahati to promote and facilitate the farmer communities and to bring a green revolution through the COE.

Alay holds a master’s degree in Social Work from Tata Institute of Social Science, Mumbai. He has served as Senior Fellow at The Institute of Policy Studies, John Hopkins University, in 2001 under its International Philanthropy Fellows Program. He was also awarded a Ford Motor Company International Fellowship in 2010 as a community leader.

Dheeraj Singh Rawat

Accounts Officer

Dheeraj Rawat is the Accounts Executive at ICCo. He is associated with ICCo since January 2016. He comes with 10 years of experience in Accounts & Finance in both, the public and the private sector. At ICCo, Dheeraj manages finalization of accounts, day-to-day accounts, audit queries, taxation and service tax and is a valuable asset for ICCo.

Dheeraj holds a Master’s degree in Commerce (M.Com).

Kangkan Kakati

Executive Agri Value Chain

He has 2 year working experience as a Junior Research Fellow under the aegis of Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat in various capacities. He also had a brief stint as a Junior Research Fellow at Regional Agricultural Research Station, Titabar. During his tenure as junior research fellow, he worked in multifarious research projects like BRNS sponsored project on development of Mutant line of Gladiolus flower and DBT sponsored project on mainstreaming of rice germplasm through GWAS. He is good at resource mobilization and finances. He is a Master degree holder from Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat under the Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics.

Vanisha Gogoi

Account Associate

She has 2 year work experience in the fields of Education, Accounts and Event Management She worked in organisations like Media Unlimited and Stanford Pre School. Currently, she is working as an Accounts coordinator in ICCo. She has skills in book keeping and other accounting practices. She graduated from Guwahati Commerce College.ics.

Sanghamitra Dutta

Coordinator, Resource mobilization and documentation

Dilip Chetri

Office Coordinator

Rupam Jyoti Nath

Executive, Fishery

Punctual and dedicated towards Aquacultural research activities and also passionate about various allied departments like Aquatic Environment Management, Fish Processing Technology, Fisheries Resource Management etc. with an experience of over 6 months. He has experience in analyzing soil and water quality parameters, research work in mitigation of climate change by carbon sequestration from floodplain wetland of Brahmaputra Valley, experience in molecular Biotechnology viz. DNA isolation, PCR, Gel Electrophoresis, Gel Documentation, DNA sequencing, sequence submission on NCBI database. He has completed his Masters of Fisheries Science from the College of Fisheries, Assam Agricultural University, Raha. Currently, he is incorporated in “ICCo” as Executive- Fishery under “Ajim Premji Philanthropic Initiatives (APPI)” funded project at Morigaon district, Assam.

Chitraban Sarma

Handloom & Textile Expert

He has over 7 years of experience in Handloom & Textile sector, Entrepreneurship Development, and project management of Handloom & Textile and Sericulture. His core areas of expertise are in weaving Technology, Rearing Reeling & Spinning of Silk, Natural & Chemical Dyeing, Livelihood promotion especially through Handloom & Sericulture activities, Resource Mobilization, Activities of livelihood and entrepreneurship development projects in Handloom & Sericulture sector, Product Development & Diversification, Project Management & Implementation etc. He completed his engineering in Textile Technology and presently working with ICCo in the capacity of a Handloom & Textile Expert.