BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Managing Director, Hi-Tech Arai Private Limited, India

Mr. B.T. Bangera is presently the Managing Director of Hi-Tech Arai Private Limited. He is a B.E.(Electrical)and has done his MBA from IIM Ahmadabad.

Mr. B.T. Bangera has worked for M/S ASEA Brown Boveri Ltd., for over 16 years in various senior positions starting with Technical Assistant to the Managing Director and then Corporate Planning, Systems and Procedures, EDP and as Material Manager. In 1986, joined FENNER INDIA LTD., as General Manager Materials.

In 1990, he embraced the challenge of establishing an organization by becoming the Managing Director of the SSI Unit M/s. HI-TECH ARAI LTD in Madurai. Starting with a modest annual sales turnover of ₹80 lakhs, he guided the company to achieve a remarkable growth, reaching over ₹650 crores in 2019. M/s. HI-TECH ARAI is now a joint venture with M/s. MITSUBISHI CORPORATION, JAPAN, and M/s. ARAI SEISAKUSHO CO., LTD, JAPAN.

His other positions include

• Chairman of Thiagarajar School of Management, Madurai.
• Director of Loyal Textiles Limited, Chennai.
• He is the member of Board of Governors and Board of Studies of number of Management Institutes and Engineering Colleges.
• Under CII Southern Region he has been mentoring number of Industrial Clusters for converting them into World Class.
• Managing Trustee of SAI TRUST, Madurai.
• Past Chairman of Confederation of Indian Industry, Madurai Zone.
• Past President of Madurai Management Association and past chairman of All India Management Association, Southern Region.
• Past National Director of Quality Circle Forum of India.
• Past Chairman of Madurai City Technical Advisory Group under JNNURM(Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission).

Ms. K. Noorjehan, Vice Chairperson, DHAN Foundation is currently an Administrative member of Central Administrative Tribunal, Ernakulam Bench. She was the Chief Post Master General, Haryana Postal Circle and later became Chief Principal Post Master General of Maharasthra circle. She was subsequently promoted to the grade of Member, Postal Services Board. She has over 30 years of experience in different parts of the country. She was instrumental in computerising postal operations in the southern region, and in creating own infrastructure for several post offices. She is interested in women development, especially the poor and the disadvantaged.

Dr. Ranade is a noted economist. He received his PhD in Economics from Brown University, US. Before that, he did Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, after completing B. Tech. in Electrical Engineering at the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay.

Ranade has been a former member of the Board of Management at the Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics. Before joining the Institute as the Vice-Chancellor, he was the Group Executive President and Chief Economist with the Aditya Birla Group, a $50 billion diversified multinational conglomerate

His 32-year career has spanned both academic and corporate assignments. He has taught in universities in India and the US. He has served as a member of several committees of the Reserve Bank of India and as a member of apex committees of national industry bodies such as the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI). He was appointed a member of the Economic Task Force for post-Covid economic recovery by the Chief Minister of Maharashtra.

Dr. Ranade has many publications in reputed journals and is one of the authors of the recent award-winning book Rising to the China Challenge. He is also a regular columnist in leading financial newspapers and has numerous columns on different areas of the economy.

Mr. Ramasubramanian Gandhi is currently a financial sector policy expert and adviser. He advises banks, finance companies, fintech entities, payment system entities, investors and funds on subjects ranging from financial regulations and Indian economy. He is an independent director on the boards of several financial sector entities like bank, market infrastructure, account aggregator, information utility and fintech, among others. He is a prolific speaker and covers, including these areas, wide range of subjects.

He was a Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of India for three years from 2014 to 2017. He had been a seasoned and accomplished central banker for 37 years. He had a three year secondment to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), the capital market regulator. He also held the charge of Director of the Institute for Development and Research in Banking Technology IDRBT), Hyderabad.

He has been associated with various committees, working groups and task forces, both domestic and international. He was one of the initial members of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC). He was a member of the Basle Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) and the Committee on Global Financial Systems (CGFS), Basle.

He has been educated in India and abroad. He has a master’s degree in Economics from the Annamalai University, in Tamil Nadu, India. He also has post graduate level certificates in Management Information System from The American University, Washington DC, USA and in Capital Market from the City University of New York, New York, USA. His technical education includes a certificate course in System Programming from the IBM Education, Sydney, Australia. He also has a certificate in Gandhian Thoughts from the Madurai University, Tamil Nadu, India. He was born in 1956.

Mr. Premanand has more than 25 years of experience in DHAN Foundation. He started his development work in Theni district and played the role of Project Consultant to Government of Puducherry for the European Union funded Tank Rehabilitation Project (1998-2002) as a DHAN representative. This gave him rich experience of working with Indian and European team members.

Later he was transferred to Madurai Central Office and became the Team Leader for the theme of Information and Communication for Development (2004-2012). During the year 2012 he played the key role of the Principal for the IGNOU Community College (CDF6228) and also served as the Director of DHAN People Academy - DPA (2013-2017). He played the key role of introducing 21 new certificate courses related to computer science in the IGNOU Community Colleges. Under his leadership 2 new diplomas & 3 new certificate courses were started at DHAN People Academy in addition to the Diploma in Panchayat Management.

Later in 2017 he was inducted as faculty at The DHAN Academy. He coordinates the TECH discipline of TDA and handles the courses on Participatory Learning Methods, Sustainable Livelihoods, Social Development, Tank-fed Agriculture and Watershed Management. He customised the participatory learning techniques for case analysis as an ease to use & student friendly technology particularly for average and below average students. Similarly, he customised simulations for demonstration of participatory methods & techniques.

Currently he is CEO of the Small Millet Foundation (2020 onwards). He has presented a paper in the International Microinsurance Conference held at Tanzania (2012) and also underwent technical training at Achmea, The Netherlands and at the National Remote Sensing Centre, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

Programme Leader,

Coordinator of North-Indian Projects,

(Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, and Jharkhand),

DHAN Foundation.

A student of Commerce, working in the Development sector for the past 30 years. She started her development career as an Accountant for a Kalanjiam SHG federation in a remote block situated in the Western Ghats. She developed Accounting and Auditing system for SHGs and SHGs federations. Followed by that she served several roles at district and the national office of DHAN Foundation. She contributed to Policy development for Savings, credit and other financial products of Kalanjiam Community Banking of DHAN Foundation.

She coordinated more than 100 training programmes at state and national levels for, Field staffs of Pudhu VaZvhu team members, Field associates of Kalanjiam and Executive of DHAN, People Leaders of SHGs and development practitioners. She anchored DHAN’s vertical, “PACE - People Accounts and Auditing Enabling Centre” for five years, to help support streamlining SHG accounts of 150+ federations in India accounting to gross turn-over to the tune of about Rs.1000 Cr. per year.

She collaborated with various government projects on system strengthening and capacitating their staff. She is an expert in the domains of Accounts & Audit, Capacity development, Institution building and community-based Product & policy formulation.

Presently she is coordinating community banking, water and health projects in 4 North-Indian states ( Madhyapradesh, Rajasthan, Bihar and Jharkhand) to benefit about 50,000 poor families in this region.

Mr. M.P. Vasimalai, Executive Director of DHAN Foundation is a post graduate in Agriculture and a management graduate from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. He has over three decades of experience in development work and one of the key people in setting up Professional Assistance for Development Action (PRADAN). He was instrumental in setting up DHAN Foundation in 1997. He has specialised in community organisation, designing development interventions in the fields of natural resource management, livelihood promotion and institutional development. He has traveled extensively within and outside India and has participated/ presented papers on these themes. He is also holding various positions in national and international forums, working groups, task forces and missions of Central and State governments on these themes. He was instrumental in promoting various network organisations. His areas of interest are institution building, leadership development and promoting various development themes for poverty reduction.