Vivek Wadhwa is an academic, entrepreneur, and author of five best-selling books: From Incremental to Exponential; Your Happiness Was Hacked; The Driver in the Driverless Car; Innovating Women; and The Immigrant Exodus.

He has been a globally syndicated columnist for The Washington Post and has held appointments as Distinguished Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program, Carnegie Mellon University, and Emory University; adjunct professor at Carnegie Mellon and Duke University; fellow at Stanford Law School and UC Berkeley; and head of faculty at Singularity University.

Vivek is based in Silicon Valley and researches, speaks, and writes about advancing technologies that are transforming our world. These advances – in fields such as robotics, artificial intelligence, computing, synthetic biology, 3D printing, medicine, and nanomaterials – are making it possible for small teams to do what was once possible only for governments and large corporations to do: solve the grand challenges in education, water, food, shelter, health, and security.

In 2012, the U.S. Government awarded Wadhwa distinguished recognition as an “Outstanding American by Choice” for his “commitment to this country and to the common civic values that unite us as Americans”.

He was also named one of the world’s “Top 100 Global Thinkers” by Foreign Policy magazine in that year; in June 2013, he was on TIME magazine’s list of “Tech 40”, one of forty of the most influential minds in tech; and in September 2015, he was second on a list of “ten men worth emulating” in The Financial Times. In 2018, he was awarded Silicon Valley Forum’s Visionary Award, a list of luminaries “who have made Silicon Valley synonymous with creativity and life-changing advancements in technology”.

Venkat is the Founder and CEO of Karkinos Healthcare, a purpose driven, technology led, oncology platform. Earlier, he was an Advisor to the Chairman, Reliance Industries Limited. Prior to his association with Reliance, Venkat spent more than a decade and a half with the Tata Group in various capacities. His last assignment in the Tata Group was as Managing Trustee of the Tata Trusts wherein he was responsible for the operations, oversight and co-ordination between the various Tata Trusts.

During his stint in the Chairman’s office of Tata Sons, Venkat was part of several significant projects including the Tata Motors acquisition of Jaguar Land Rover, launch of the small car Nano, creation of several Joint Ventures, responses in operating companies during the 2008 financial crisis etc. Prior to his stint with Mr. Tata’s office, Venkat was associated as Head of Business Support at the Qatar Foundation. Venkat is a science graduate and has done his MBA from the Sri Satya Sai University, Puttaparthi. He is also a Law Graduate from Mumbai University and has completed his Advanced Management Program (AMP) from the Harvard Business School. He has also completed his EngD from the University of Warwick, UK on role of Technology in Health Care Systems.

Vineet Rai is the Founder of Aavishkaar Group and chairs its Board and Group Executive Council. Aavishkaar Group is an Impact Investment Platform impacting millions of people in Asia and Africa using an entrepreneurship based development approach.

Vineet believes in building impact ecosystems to deliver real Impact as enshrined in the vision of Aavishkaar Group “We exist to bridge the Opportunity gap for the Emerging 3 Billion”. Vineet believes that Impact Investing has the potential to change the world of finance irreversibly.

The Group’s ecosystems include Aavishkaar Capital – the Impact fund manager focused on Global South, Arohan – One of India’s largest & most digitally advanced microfinance institution (MFI) targeting low income households, Ashv Finance – a Fin Tech NBFC, offering unique cash flow based business loans to Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises and IntelleCap –building Impact Ecosystems globally.

Aavishkaar Group has 8000 employees, manages assets in excess of US $ 1.2 Billion while trying to serve needs of entrepreneurs from debt of US $ 150 (INR 10 thousands) to equity of US $ 15 Million (INR 100 Crore) while aligning the group to 13 out of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals or SDG’s.

Vineet has received numerous awards including the 2021 Access-HSBC Inclusive Finance India Award for personal contribution to Financial Inclusion in India, TIE Hall of Fame 2018, the Impact Investor of the Year by News Corp for 2016, Porter Prize for Strategic Leadership in Social Space, 2016, CNBC TV 18 Award for being the Catalyst Fund for India 2016, G 20 – SME Innovation in Finance Award 2010 in Seoul South Korea, UNDP-IBLF –ICC World Business Award in 2005 and Lemelson Award for Social Venture Investing. In 2021 Vineet Rai and Swati Rai (Co-Founder) was awarded the Faces of Vibrant Bharat 2021 by Grant Thorton Bharat. He is an Ashoka Fellow and Honorary Member of XLRI Alumni Association.

In 2022, Vineet has been appointed on the G20 Start up 20 Engagement Group Task Force on Sustainability and Securities and Exchange Board of India has appointed him on Advisory Committee of the Social Stock Exchange. Vineet was invited by the Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi for his “Roundtable interaction with Venture Capital and Private Equity Funds”. In 2021. Vineet was also invited by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi for consultations on doubling the income of the farmers in September 2017 as part of his champions of change program. Vineet has also served on the advisory committee of SEBI for the formation of Social Stock Exchange, as Commissioner at the Business Commission for Sustainable Development, as Senior Advisor to Blended Finance Working Group at OECD and as an Advisor to United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific Science Technology and Innovation Advisory Board.

Vineet featured on the cover of Forbes India, January 2018 issue. Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever endorsed Aavishkaar Intellecap Group for its efforts in furthering inclusive development.

Driving on Indian roads is one of his passions and he tries to cover 50,000 KM every year.

Mr. Vijay Mahajan is an internationally known Indian rural development professional, social entrepreneur and a policy analyst. He is the founder of reputed organizations such as Pradan and the Basix Social Enterprise Group. He has also served on the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India Rangarajan Committee on Financial Inclusion and the Raghuram Rajan Committee on Financial Sector Reforms. He has published over 20 papers in prestigious Indian and international journals, contributed chapters in 15 academic books and has authored over 70 papers/articles in the area of rural development, livelihood promotion and employment, microfinance, financial inclusion, social innovations and entrepreneurship. He is an alumnus of Indian Institute of Management – Ahmedabad and Indian Institute of Technology – Delhi, and was mid-career Fellow at the Princeton University, USA.

Amarjeet Sinha is currently posted as Member, Public Enterprises Selection Board (PESB). He was earlier posted as Advisor to the Prime Minister till 31 July 2021. An Indian Administrative Service (IAS) Officer of Bihar Cadre of 1983 batch, he retired in December 2019 as Secretary, Department of Rural Development, Government of India. He has 40 years of experience in Government, largely in the rural and social sector. He has had the unique distinction of having played a major role in designing Sarva Siksha Abhiyan (India’s main programme for universal education), the National Rural Health Mission, and in bringing about governance reforms in programmes for rural areas covering livelihoods, employment, housing, social security, skills, rurban development, and road construction. He also coordinated successfully the work of Gram Swaraj Abhiyan in 2018 to reach seven pro-poor public welfare interventions (LPG, electricity, Bank Account, life and accident insurance, LED Bulbs, and Immunization) to 63974 large villages with over 50% vulnerable social group population. Multi-Dimensional Poverty and its Reduction, Public Policy and Public Management are areas of his work.

At the State level, Amarjeet served in the education and health sectors. He has also had the opportunity to serve in the remote tribal district of Singhbhum in present day Jharkhand and in the Naxalite affected Jehanabad district of Bihar.

He has also been training Indian Administrative Service Officer Trainees at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie on the social sector for the last 30 years. He has the distinction of having travelled to over 90% of India’s districts to promote human development initiatives.

Sinha has published seven books on public policy and a large number of articles in publications such as Lancet, Economic and Political Weekly, Economic Times, The Hindu, The Indian Express, The Times of India, The Business Standard, The Hindustan Times, etc. His last book “An India for Everyone – A Path to Inclusive Development”, was published by Harper Collins in 2013. Hindi translation of the book, “Hum Sab ka Bharat”, is also available. His forthcoming book, “The Last Mile – Turning Public Policy Upside Down”, is being published by Routledge, UK and is likely to be released by September 2023. He has recently contributed to the Notion Press Book on fifteen Change Makers, The Book of Aspiration. Amarjeet has been regularly writing Op Eds for all the leading Indian dailies on issues of human well-being, community connect, decentralization, and a more inclusive India.

Amarjeet has been associated with Public Policy with Azim Premji University, ISB, ISPP, Kautilya School of Public Policy, etc. He delivered the ICSSR Annual Lecture 2022 on Bridging the Last Mile in Pro-Poor Public Welfare. He is also an Advisor to Sampark Foundation for frugal innovations on scale in education, on Health and Human Development with the Centre for Social and Economic Progress, and with Women’s World Bank on Making Finance Work for Women. He was a Member of the Jury for The Indian Express Governance Awards this year. He Chairs a Committee for suggesting reforms in the MGNREGS. Amarjeet Chairs the Gender Expert Committee of the Reserve Bank Innovation Hub.

A student of St. Stephen’s College, he topped the Delhi University and is a recipient of the National Talent Scholarship, the Rhodes Scholarship and the Oxford Cambridge Society of India Scholarship. He has also been the President of the St. Stephen’s College Students’ Union Society.

Aliva Das leads Youth Initiative in TRIF particularly focused on 4 E – Employability, Entitlements, Education, Entrepreneurship. She has 10+ years of unique experience working both with the government in implementation and policy-making and directly with the youth communities. She has pioneered the “Yuva Compass'' solution to catalyze economic opportunities for rural youth and migrants in remote locations of the country. Before TRIF, she was working with Madhya Pradesh State Skill Mission as a Consultant. She has extensive experience in skill development and youth employment. She was also a Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fellow (PMRDF) in Odisha. She is a postgraduate from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.