Inaugural Session

Mr. Ajay Tyagi assumed office as Chairman of Securities & Exchange Board of India (SEBI) with effect from March 1, 2017.

 In a career spanning over 32 years, Mr. Tyagi, a former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) Officer, has held several responsible positions with distinction in the State and Central Governments.

Prior to assuming office as Chairman, SEBI, Mr. Tyagi has served as an Additional Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, Government of India, handling diverse areas like Capital Markets, Investment, Infrastructure Financing, Financial Sector Reforms, Financial Stability Issues and Coins & Currency. Earlier, he served as a Joint Secretary in the Ministries of Environment & Forests and Petroleum & Natural Gas. He also served as Secretary of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board.

 In the Government of Himachal Pradesh, he has served as Principal Secretary in the Departments of Finance, Planning, Industries and Information Technology.

 Mr. Tyagi did his graduation in Electrical Engineering and post-graduation in Computer Science. He has also done his Masters in Public Administration from Harvard University.

Inaugural Session

Shri Santosh Kumar Mohanty is an IRS Officer of 1991 Batch and is presently posted as a Whole Time Member, Securities and Exchange Board of India in Mumbai since June 2018. 

 Prior to taking charge as Whole Time Member, Shri Mohanty held the position of Executive Director, Securities and Exchange Board of India, on Deputation since September 2015. 

 As a Whole Time Member of SEBI, Shri Mohanty is now looking after the Departments dealing with Primary Markets, Surveillance, Corporation Finance Investigation, Commodity Derivative Market Regulation, Research Department and Information Technology Department.   He has chaired a committee set up by the Government to recommend ware housing norms for Non-Agricultural commodities.  He also served as a member of High Powered Integration Committee constituted by the Government for recommending on integration of spot and derivatives market in India.

Inaugural Session

Before joining the Securities Appellate Tribunal in 2016, Nair was an officer of the Indian Economic Service [1985 batch] for about 31 years and held various positions in the Government of India including Director [Commodity Derivatives Market], Director [Development Policy], Director [Capital Markets], Adviser [Capital Markets], Secretary [FSLRC] in the Ministries of Food and Consumer Affairs, Planning Commission and Finance Ministry.   He was involved in substantive policy-law-institutional reforms in the financial sector in these capacities. These include report of the Financial Sector Legislative Reforms Commission, Bankruptcy Law Reforms leading to the enactment of the “Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016”, reforming commodity derivatives market regulation culminating in the merger of the Forward Markets Commission with the Securities and Exchange Board of India and a modern monetary policy framework with a Monetary Policy Committee and culminating in necessary amendments to the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934; to mention a few of such reforms.

Dr. Nair started his career in 1983 as a lecturer of Economics in Union Christian College, Aluva, Kerala.

Dr. Nair has a Ph.D. in Economics/Market Regulation from the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi. He also has a Masters in Development Economics from the University of East Anglia, UK and Masters and Bachelor’s degrees in Economics from the Kerala University.

Inaugural Session 

Nikhil was appointed Chief Executive of the FCA on 1 October 2020.

He began his career in HM Treasury before serving as Private Secretary to the Prime Minister between 2005 – 2008. Nikhil then became Head of the Financial Stability Unit, overseeing a number of the UK’s financial stability interventions before becoming HM Treasury’s Director of the Financial Services Group from 2009 – 2014. In that role, he also served as the UK representative to the EU Financial Services Committee.

Nikhil joined the London Stock Exchange (LSE) in 2014, and was appointed CEO in 2015.

Nikhil holds a BA in philosophy, politics and economics from the University of Oxford.

Inaugural Session 

Mr. Sunil Kadam is the Registrar of National Institute of Securities Markets (NISM), an educational initiative of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). Mr. Kadam holds a degree of Master of Business Administration (MBA) from University of Pune. Prior to taking over as Registrar of NISM, Mr. Kadam was Regional Director of Northern Regional Office of SEBI. Mr. Kadam has joined SEBI in 1996 and during his tenure in SEBI he has worked in various departments in SEBI and handled the work relating to administration and inspection of Market Infrastructure Institutions (MIIs) and SEBI registered intermediaries, surveillance and investigations, corporation finance, forensic accounting, corporate governance, Business Responsibility Reports, Indian Depository Receipts (IDRs), E-voting, search and seizure, treasury and accounts, enquiry and adjudications, litigations, etc.

Mr. Kadam was also a member of SEBI Committee on Disclosures and Accounting Standards (SCODA) and Auditing & Assurance Standards Board of The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI). He has also represented SEBI in Asian Roundtable on Corporate Governance meetings organized by the Organization for Economic Co- operation and Development (OECD) and was also part of OECD report on “Related Party Transactions and Minority Shareholder Protection”.

Panel Discussion I – Sustainable Finance – New Era of Investing and Reporting

Ajit has over 30 years of experience in the investment management and financial services industry. In 1990 Ajit founded Quantum Advisors Private Limited (Quantum Advisors); an India-focused, multi-asset, investment advisor and investment manager.

Ajit has worked with leading US and UK investment management firms either as a key member of the executive management team or, through Quantum Advisors, as a joint venture partner. He has also served as a Deputy Chief Investment Officer at Hansberger Global Investors, Inc, USA, and, on behalf of HGI, was the lead manager for the Vanguard International Value Fund from 1999 till 2004.

In 1996, Quantum pioneered the adoption of an “Integrity Screen” to sift out companies with poor governance or questionable practices from client portfolios. In 2015, this evolved into a broader proprietary ESG database and resulted in the launch of the Quantum India ESG Fund in July 2019 – the first primary offering of an ESG fund in India. In 2018, Quantum AMC tied up with HelpYourNGO to offer investors a “Smile” option – the proceeds of which would be distributed to a wide number of NGOs furthering the SDG-17 goals.   

Ajit has spent much of his career trying to help individual investors make long term sensible investment decisions. The popular stock market portal Equitymaster.com (launched in April 1996) and the wealth advisory and financial planning PersonalFN.com (launched in 1999) websites were part of the “original” Quantum. In 2006 Quantum AMC – the 100% subsidiary of Quantum Advisors – launched India’s first direct-to-investor family of products under the Quantum Mutual Funds banner.

Ajit is also the founder of HelpYourNGO, a financial database of over 650 Not-For-Profit organisations which helps these organisations improve their efficiency and efficacy. The National Streets for the Performing Arts (www.NSPA.in) started supporting busking in Mumbai in October 2012 with the simple but revolutionary idea of paying musicians a salary – with no hat or guitar box seeking donations from the audience.

Ajit is a Member of the Board of Pacific Pension Institute (PPI), a Member of the Global Leadership Council of the Univ of North Carolina and a Member of the Board of Advisors of UNC’s Kenan Flagler Business School.  

Ajit earned his Master’s degree in Business Administration (MBA) from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1983 after completing his Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Bombay University in 1981.

Panel Discussion I – Sustainable Finance – New Era of Investing and Reporting

Conor chairs the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) – a coalition of 70 organisations dedicated to improving ‘ESG’ reporting. He is board member of the Value Reporting Foundation (SASB ESG standards) and is a member of the G7 Impact Taskforce.

He is an Advisory Board member at Blackrock and a Special Advisor at McKinsey where he founded and co-leads McKinsey’s Board Intelligence Forum for chairs and non-executive directors.

Previously, he founded McKinsey’s Private Equity Industry Practice and latterly McKinsey New Ventures. Originally a software engineer, he also led McKinsey’s Tech and Telecom Practice in Europe. He advises a small number of software-based growth stage companies along with the Turing Institute (the UK’s national data science institute) where he chaired the recent research fellowship award committee.

Conor was a founding member of a UN Development Goals organisation bringing IT to schools in developing countries. He is also an adjunct lecturer at Tsinghua University in Beijing and, recently, he has refreshed his old software engineering skills – completing Stanford’s Machine Learning Course in May 2018.

He joined McKinsey from the then FTSE100 Granada Group where he was a member of the Board Executive Committee and a Divisional Chairman.

He has a first class honours degree in electronic engineering from Trinity College Dublin, where he was a Foundation Scholar, and an MBA (with distinction) from INSEAD.

Panel Discussion I – Sustainable Finance – New Era of Investing and Reporting

Joanne Henstock is an Executive Director with ‘The Prince’s Accounting for Sustainability Project’ (A4S), established by His Royal Highness -The Prince of Wales in 2004. Joanne joined A4S in 2021, following on from an established consultancy career in ESG/sustainability disciplines with a large global accountancy firm. 

Joanne’s core experience relates to the governance, technical and policy aspects of sustainability integration, including strategic management of thereof, ESG/ sustainability reporting and related assurance processes designed to support value-relevance of sustainability and ESG reporting for investment markets and wider stakeholder constituencies.

Joanne has worked extensively in a cross-sectoral context, and as part of previous roles has at various times worked closely with various national and global regulation and public policy bodies; also with national and global standard-setting bodies. She also held various academic roles with tertiary education institutes in South Africa and New Zealand. Joanne is a chartered accountant in New Zealand and South Africa. She also holds memberships in various corporate director institutes, including the Institute of Directors in New Zealand and the Australian Institute of Company Directors

Panel Discussion I – Sustainable Finance – New Era of Investing and Reporting

Mr. R. Mukundan, Managing Director & CEO of Tata Chemicals Limited, joined Tata Administrative Service in 1990, after completion of MBA from FMS, Delhi University.  He is a distinguished alumnus of IIT, Roorkee, Fellow of Indian Chemical Society and an alumnus of Harvard Business School. During his 30 year career with Tata Group, he has held various responsibilities across the Chemical, Automotive and Hospitality sectors of the Tata Group. He serves on industry forums and impact organizations.

Panel Discussion I – Sustainable Finance – New Era of Investing and Reporting

Mr. Cyril Shroff is the Managing Partner of Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas since May 2015. He was previously the Managing Partner of Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A. Shroff & Co.

He has over 40 years of experience in a range of areas including corporate and securities law, disputes, banking, bankruptcy, infrastructure, private client, financial regulatory and others. He is consistently ranked as ‘star practitioner’ in India by Chambers Global and often regarded as the ‘M&A King of India’. He is regularly recognized as an award-winning professional across various practices. Who’s Who Legal 2022 recognized him as ‘Thought Leader Global Elite for M&A and Governance.

He is the Chairman of the FICCI’s Corporate Laws Committee and a member of CII National Council and Financial Markets Committee. Mr. Shroff has been a part of various committees viz. SEBI constituted Uday Kotak Committee on Corporate Governance, various committees of CII, council on corporate Governance, National Committee on Capital Markets. He is a Board Member of Krea University, member of the Apex Advisory Board of Adani Institute of Infrastructure Management, Member of the Advisory Board of the centre for Study of the Legal Profession established by the Harvard law School and a member of the Advisory Board of National Institute of Securities Markets.

Mr. Shroff has completed his B.A. LLB from Government Law College in 1982.

Panel Discussion II – Passive Investing

Nilesh Shah is Group President and Managing Director of Kotak Mahindra Asset Management Company Limited. He has over 25 years of experience in capital markets, having managed funds across equity, fixed income securities and real estate for local and global investors. In his previous assignments, Mr. Shah has held leadership roles with Axis Capital, ICICI Prudential Asset Management, Franklin Templeton and ICICI Securities.

Nilesh was part of the team that has received “Best Fund House of the Year” Award at all the mutual funds where he has worked.

Nilesh is part time member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister.

Mr. Shah is a gold medalist chartered accountant and a merit ranking cost accountant. His hobbies include reading and educating investors on financial planning. He has co-authored A Direct Take, a book on Financial Planning.

He is a recipient of Rotary Foundation Educational Award, 2000 for promoting leadership development and international understanding by Rotary International, USA. 

Panel Discussion II – Passive Investing

Mr. Chokshi is the co-founder and promoter of N J Group of companies. He is presently working in the capacity of Joint Managing Director in the holding company. He is acting as Chairman of the recently set up asset management business and also acting as a Director in NBFC NJ Capital Private Limited.

Business of NJ Group spread across mutual fund distribution, investment advisory, portfolio management services, real estate development, information technology, training and education and

insurance broking. NJ has won several awards for outstanding sales performance for mutual fund sales

from most of the asset management companies at national level across all the categories of distributors including domestic and foreign banks.

Mr Neeraj Choksi has served as the member of the SEBIs mutual fund advisory committee for six years (2011-2017). Apart from the same he has been active across various groups and sub committees formed by SEBI. Currently, he is reappointed as the member of the SEBI Mutual Fund Advisory Committee and acting as a member of CDSL Business Advisory Committee, CDSL Business Advisory Committee, NSE Trading Members Advisory Committee.

Mr. Chokshi is actively involved as a trustee in the NJ Charitable trust working towards the upliftment of underprivileged children by providing them quality education and educational resources.

 He is also an active Rotarian since 1996. He is the recipient of the ‘Outstanding Young Business man of the Year’ award for the year 2008 by Junior Chamber at the Zonal Level.  

Mr. Chokshi is a graduate in Business management from Sardar Patel University in the year 1992.  

Panel Discussion II – Passive Investing

Arnaud Llinas is a Managing Director of Amundi Asset Management in charge of ETF, Indexing and Smart Beta business line. He has 20 years of experience in capital markets, from cash equity to derivatives trading.

Arnaud Llinas has been a member of the executive committee of Lyxor Asset Management and Wealth & Asset Management unit of Société Générale in Paris. As Head of Lyxor ETF division since 2013, Lyxor ETF became one of the top 3 ETF issuers in Europe.

Arnaud started his career as a risk analyst at Fauchier Partners, BNP AM fund of hedge funds arm in London.  He joined the market making desk at SG CIB in 2004 in the Equity department. From 2005 to 2008, he participated actively to the development of the SG Equity index platform and worked hand in hand with Lyxor to develop the ETF range.

He became Head of 1 Delta Listed Products trading team in 2008 covering Structuring and Market-Making for ETFs, Certificates, Single stock and Dividend futures in Europe.

Arnaud holds an engineering degree from the French Ecole Supérieure d’Electricité (Supélec) as well as a Master’s degree in Finance from Pierre & Marie Curie University.

Panel Discussion II – Passive Investing

Monika Halan is a trusted personal finance writer, speaker and author who helps families get their money decisions right. She is the founder of Dhan Chakra Financial Education and the best-selling author of Let’s Talk Money. She is an Adjunct Professor both at the National Institute of Securities Markets, a Sebi-founded educational institution and at the Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs, a Ministry of Corporate Affairs think tank. She is a regular speaker on financial literacy, regulation, inclusion and consumer issues in retail finance. She has a Master’s in Economics from the Delhi School of Economics and a second Master’s in Journalism Studies from College of Cardiff, University of Wales, UK. She has worked across various media organisations in India, including Mint, The Economic Times and The Indian Express, and was Editor Outlook Money. She has run four successful TV series around personal finance in NDTV, Zee and Bloomberg India.

Monika has public policy experience as Member of the Task Force set up by the Government of India to put in place the Financial Redressal Agency, Member on the Sebi Mutual Fund Advisory Committee from 2009 to 2021, Member on the Ministry of Finance Committee on Incentives (Bose Committee), and Advisor to Swarup Committee in 2009.

She has four published academic papers in the field of household finance

• Impact of Information Disclosure on Consumer Behaviour: Case of ATI Bonds, Niyati Agrawal, Monami Dasgupta, Monika Halan, Misha Sharma, Madhu Srinivas, Dvara Research, 2021.
• Regulating consumer finance: Do disclosures matter? The case of life insurance. Monika Halan and Renuka Sane, NIPFP Working Paper Series, 2017.
• Misled and mis-sold: financial misbehaviour by retail banks? Monika Halan and Renuka Sane, Journal of Comparative Economics, 2017.
• The case of the missing billions: estimating losses to customers due to mis-sold life insurance policies. Monika Halan, Renuka Sane, Susan Thomas, Journal of Economic Policy Reform, 2014.

She was a Director on the Financial Planning Standards Board India and is a Member of the Editor’s Guild.

 She is an author of the best-selling book Let’s Talk Money (Harper Collins, 2018). The Hindi translation Baat Paise Ki was released in December 2020. The book has been translated in Marathi and Punjabi. Her first book Seven Steps to Financial Freedom was published by Macmillan in 2005. She is based in New Delhi and was chosen as a Yale World Fellow in 2011.

Panel Discussion III – Social Stock Exchange – The Way Forward

Ved founded SRIJAN, E2F, SIDS, and Buddha Fellowship Program. He is the founder national convenor of CSO collaborative called RCRC.

Under his stewardship, SRIJAN became one of the leading names in the social sector.  He stepped down as its CEO in 2018. 

IIT Kanpur conferred on him Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2020.  Business Standard chose Ved as a Social Entrepreneur of the Year (2018).  Ved was a member of the Technical Group on Social Stock Exchange set up by SEBI. He is a member of several policy making bodies including the Advisory Committee, Promotion of Producers’ Enterprises, Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India.

Ved is an aeronautical engineer from IIT Kanpur (class of 1979) and a management graduate from IIM Ahmedabad (class of 1981).

As a Hubert Humphrey Fellow for the year 1990-91, he further pursued education at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Boston University, and worked at the World Bank, Washington, DC, USA. He was invited to the Environmental Management course at Tufts University as a UNEP Fellow (1991).

Publications -Arya and Bhogal. Human Resource Strategies to Build Pro-Poor Institutions. McGraw Hill Education. 2014. ISBN-13:978-93-392-1827-0.

His articles have been published by IFPRI, Washington and ODI, London.

PPanel Discussion III – Social Stock Exchange – The Way Forward

Mr. Chandra joined Bain Capital Private Equity in 2008 as a member of its Asia-Pacific leadership team. He is the founder and Chairman of its India office.

Prior to joining Bain Capital, Mr. Chandra spent most of his professional career at DSP Merrill Lynch, a leading investment bank in India. He retired from DSP Merrill Lynch in 2007 as a Board Member & it’s Managing Director. Prior to his MBA, Mr. Chandra worked at India’s leading engineering & construction firm, Larsen & Toubro.

Over the years Mr. Chandra has served on the Boards of many leading corporates and not for profits including Tata Sons, Genpact, Ashoka University, Piramal Enterprises, Emcure Pharmaceuticals, Akanksha Foundation, Tata Investments, and Give India.

His wife Archana and he received the “Asia Heroes of Philanthropy Award” in 2016. Mr. Chandra received his MBA from Boston College, and was awarded the school’s Distinguished Alumni in 2007, a year in which he was also named by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader. He received his undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering from VJTI, Bombay University.

Panel Discussion III – Social Stock Exchange – The Way Forward

Having embarked on his journey in the development sector by living and working for several years among remote forest based tribal communities in the southern Indian district of Mysuru, Dr. R Balasubramaniam (Balu) is a widely respected development activist, leadership trainer, thinker and writer. After his MBBS, he earned his MPhil in Hospital Administration & Health Systems Management from BITS, Pilani.  He has a Master’s in Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard University.  He founded the Swami Vivekananda Youth Movement based on the principles of Ahimsa, Satya, Seva and Tyaga.  He has spent the last 36 years of his life in the service of the rural and tribal poor in the forests of India. He is also the Founder and Chairman of Grassroots Research and Advocacy Movement, a public policy thinktank in India.

Dr Balu is a Tata Scholar, a Mason Fellow of the Harvard Kennedy School and a Fellow at the Hauser Center for Civil Society, Harvard University.  He was the Head and Visiting Professor of the Vivekananda Chair, University of Mysore twice.

He is currently a visiting professor at Cornell University, USA and at IIT-Delhi, India where he teaches courses on Leadership and Human Development.  He coaches and mentors senior leaders in the non-profit, corporate, government and educational sectors globally, apart from running leadership workshops for people from these sectors. He was a member of the Technical Group set up by SEBI for setting up the Social Stock Exchange in India. He is currently the full time Member-HR in the Capacity Building Commission of the Government of India. 

He has authored seven books, both in Kannada and English. 

Panel Discussion III – Social Stock Exchange – The Way Forward

Ms. Pushpa founded GuideStar India in 2009, after scaling up India’s first online giving portal GiveIndia as its COO, and with a decade of experience in the financial services sector.

GuideStar India is India’s largest and most reliable NGO information repository enabling greater giving through trust and transparency. She has established GuideStar India as a friend of the NGO community, working with them to embrace transparency and enhancing their capacity to access philanthropic resources. With more than 11,000 Indian nonprofits showcasing their work on GuideStar India and over 100,000 NGOs in its offline database, GuideStar India helps users find reliable NGOs of their choice and supports research on civil society such as the Doing Good Index. In 2015, Pushpa launched a rigorous due diligence programme to certify NGOs which has now come to be recognised as a standard for identifying credible NGOs and is used by a number of intermediaries such as Dasra, GlobalGiving, ATE Chandra Foundation, Samhita’s Good CSR, Goodera and Mastek Foundation. In 2017, Pushpa launched in India, #GivingTuesday, a global giving movement to promote generosity through collaboration and innovation.

Earlier, as the COO of GiveIndia,  Pushpa played a significant role in getting NGOs in India to participate in retail fundraising. Through her pioneering work at GiveIndia, she demystified online philanthropy to Indian NGOs by working out simple, yet effective ways of making disclosures and reporting back to donors.

Pushpa worked intensively with the Maharashtra government constituted high-powered committee for reforms in charity administration and served on the Technical Group constituted by SEBI for the proposed Social Stock Exchange.

Pushpa is an MBA Gold Medalist and a Senior Global Fellow of the Synergos Institute, New York.

Panel Discussion III – Social Stock Exchange – The Way Forward

Mr. Amarjeet Singh, working with SEBI for the last 27 years has extensive experience in regulation and supervision of securities markets. He is presently working as Executive Director in charge of Market Regulation Department responsible for policy formulation and supervision of Market Infrastructure Institutions (MIIs). He also heads the Department of Debt and Hybrid Securities dealing with Corporate Bonds, REITs, InvITs etc. and the Department of Economic Policy and Analysis at SEBI.

Previously, Mr. Singh headed the Corporation Finance Department for over 4 years, dealing with Primary Market reforms, Issuance and listing of securities, Corporate governance, Corporate restructuring, Delisting etc. Earlier between 2010 and 2017, he was heading the front office of Chairman, SEBI as his Executive Assistant and also the Office of International affairs. In his earlier stint, he headed the Northern Regional Office of SEBI at New Delhi from 2005 to 2009.

Mr. Singh has been involved in various international regulatory initiatives. He has acted as Sherpa for SEBI’s representation on the Board of International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) for 7 years. He chaired the Assessment Committee of IOSCO during 2016-18 and steered an assessment program for conducting thematic assessments at the global level.

He represents SEBI as a part time member on the board of National Financial Reporting Authority and on the board of Governors of the Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs. During 2017-19, he was on the Board of National Institute of Securities Market (NISM), an institute founded by SEBI.

He has represented SEBI on numerous Committees set up by Reserve Bank of India and Government of India. In the recent years, his nomination on such committees include Member of Core Investment Committee set up by RBI in 2019 post ILFS fiasco, Member of Committee set up by Ministry of Corporate Affairs on Corporate Social Responsibility (2019) and Insolvency Law Committee (2018).

Apart from an MBA, he holds a Master’s degree in Economic Policy Management from Columbia University, NY, USA.

He is a Member of the India Advisory Board, Newcastle University Business School, UK.

Panel Discussion IV – Valuation of New Age Tech Companies

Over a career spanning 37 years, Mohandas Pai has served in the areas of finance, accounting, information technology, human resources, education, corporate governance, social impact innovation, environmental conservation, policy formulation, heritage preservation, philanthropy, and the venture and startup ecosystem.

Mohan is currently the Chairman of Aarin Capital, Chairman of Manipal Global Education, Member of the Boards of Havells India and the Institute of Public Enterprises, Member of the Board of Governors of the National Investment and Infrastructure Fund, Governing Council Member of the Centre for Advanced Financial Research and Learning promoted by the Reserve Bank of India, Chairman of the Regulatory and Financial Technology Committee of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, Chairman of the SEBI Primary Markets Advisory Committee.

He was awarded the Padma Shri award by the President of India in 2015 and the Karnataka Rajyotsava Award in 2008.

Mohan was previously a Board Member and the Chief Financial Officer of Infosys over a span of 17 years, an Investment Committee Member of the SIDBI India Aspiration Fund and the INR 10,000 Cr  India Fund of Funds, a Board Member of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, a Member of the Board of the National Stock Exchange of India and the Ascendas Property Fund – the Trustee-Manager of Ascendas India Trust, Trustee of the International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation, Chairman of the FICCI Skills Committee and Higher Education Committee, President of the All India Management Association and Founder-Trustee of the Akshaya Patra Foundation.

Mohan holds a bachelor’s degree in commerce as a University Rank Holder from St. Joseph’s College of Commerce, Bangalore, a bachelor’s degree in law (LLB) from Bangalore University, and is a Fellow Member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India as an All-India Rank Holder. He is based in Bangalore, India.

Panel Discussion IV – Valuation of New Age Tech Companies

Sanjeev Bikhchandani is the Founder of Info Edge India Ltd. – the company that owns Naukri.com, India’s leading job site. It also owns 99acres.com, Jeevansathi.com and Shiksha.com. In addition it has invested in approximately fifty start-ups including Zomato, Policybazaar, Shopkirana, Ustraa, Gramophone, Bijnis, Shipsy and Dotpe.

Sanjeev schooled at St. Columba’s School in New Delhi.  He graduated in Economics from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi University and began his career working in advertising with Lintas. After working for three years he did his post-graduation from IIM Ahmedabad in 1989 and joined the consumer marketing firm HMM Ltd. (now called Glaxo SmithKline Consumer Healthcare Ltd.).  He quit his job for entrepreneurship eighteen months later and co-founded Info Edge.

For the first seven years as an entrepreneur, Sanjeev drifted and did a number of small businesses – from salary surveys to databases, to feasibility studies, to training. For a brief period, he was the Consulting Editor of Avenues – the careers supplement of ‘The Pioneer’ newspaper.

In 1997, Info Edge launched Naukri.com and transformed itself into an Internet company. Starting off from a servant quarter above a garage and with seed capital of two thousand rupees, the company grew and attracted investment from leading venture capitalists. It was the first Internet company to list on Indian stock exchanges.

Sanjeev is active in various industry forums and is a contributor to the entrepreneurship ecosystem. He has served as the President of the Delhi chapter of TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs). He has also served as a member of the Global Board of Trustees of TiE.  He serves as a Member of the Council of Management of All India Management Association. He has been Chair of the Internet Council of NASSCOM. He has also served on the Venture Capital Investment Committee for the SIDBI Fund of Funds for startups. Sanjeev is a member of the Board of the CIIE Initiatives at IIM Ahmedabad. He is also a member of the National Startup Advisory Council.

Apart from this, Sanjeev is also engaged in philanthropy. He is a founding trustee of Ashoka University. He is a member of the Board of Chintan – a not for profit organization that works with waste pickers in Delhi. He supports 1947 Partition Archive – a not for profit that is building an oral history archive consisting of video interviews of people who experienced partition. He also supports several other non-profit organisations.

Sanjeev has received several awards and honours.

He received the “Ernst and Young – Entrepreneur of the Year” award in 2008 for Business Transformation.  Sanjeev also won the Dataquest Pathbreaker Award & the Teacher’s Achievement Award for Business in the same year. In 2011, he was conferred the Distinguished Alumnus award by IIM Ahmedabad and in 2012 he was honoured with the CF Andrews Distinguished Alumnus award by St. Stephen’s College. He is the recipient of the Lakshmipat Singhania – IIM Lucknow National Leadership Award, as Young Leader in the Business Category for the year 2012. In April 2017, Outlook Magazine selected him as one of India’s fifty greatest CEOs ever. In 2019, he received Lifetime Achievement Award in IT given by the Financial Express.  Recently in Oct 2021, he was honoured with the Pride of India Award 2021 for Lifetime Achievement from Chiratae Ventures. In December 2021 he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Amity University.

Sanjeev was conferred with the Padma Shri Award 2020

Panel Discussion IV – Valuation of New Age Tech Companies

Prashant Jain is Executive Director & Chief Investment Officer at HDFC Mutual Fund. He has 30 years of investment management experience. Prashant holds the distinction of being the only fund manager in India & one of the few globally, to have continuously managed a scheme for over 27 years – HDFC Balanced Advantage fund (earlier known as HDFC Prudence fund).

He completed his PGDM from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore in 1991. Before this, he

has obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology,

Kanpur.

Prashant has worked with SBI Mutual Fund (1991-1993) as well as Zurich India Mutual Fund (1993-2003) in different capacities. He moved to HDFC Mutual Fund, subsequent to the takeover of Zurich India Mutual Fund by HDFC in 2003.

Panel Discussion IV – Valuation of New Age Tech Companies

Manoj Dengla is a Partner at Arpwood Partners, a private equity firm focused on buyouts. Prior to Arpwood, he was a core member of the team that set up and built The Carlyle Group’s flagship private equity business in India. Prior to Carlyle, Manoj worked in Special Situations Group at Goldman Sachs in New York where he helped build a pioneering renewable energy investing franchise. He began his career at Hindustan Unilever and later worked in structured finance and leveraged finance at ICICI.

Manoj holds as MBA from Harvard Business School where he graduated with High Distinction as a Baker Scholar. He is a rank-holder Chartered Accountant.

Panel Discussion IV – Valuation of New Age Tech Companies

Nisha Poddar is an anchor and editor at CNBC-TV18 with around 20 years of experience in journalism. Her forte lies in tracking top corporate developments with a specialisation in M&A and corporate finance. Nisha also leads the corporate bureau at the digital platform of Network 18, Moneycontrol. Nisha has signature shows like Big Deal, The Thought Leagues, CEOs Talk Sustainability

Valedictory Address

Prof N R Bhanumurthy has taken charge as a first Vice-Chancellor of Bengaluru Dr. B.R. Ambedkar School of Economics University (BASE University). He is currently on leave from NIPFP, New Delhi, where he was a Professor since 2009. Prior to this he worked as Assistant Professor and Associate Professor at Institute of Economic Growth, Delhi.

 His research areas are macro-monetary economics, fiscal policy, international money & finance, macroeconomic modeling and development economics. In these areas he has authored over 70 research papers and five books. He had brief stints at UNESCAP, Bangkok and at UNDP RCC at Colombo as Macroeconomist. He was a Visiting Fellow at MSH, Paris, Mcgill University, Montreal and ADB, Manila. He has been a consultant to UN-DESA (New York), UN-ESCWA (Beirut), UNDP-Nepal, UNDP-Bhutan, UNESCAP, ILO, the World Bank, and ADB India.

He has served on over 22 government committees constituted by Finance Ministry, Ministry of Statistics, Ministry of Rural Development, National Statistical Commission, erstwhile Planning Commission, NITI Aayog, RBI, Government of Karnataka, among others. Currently he is serving on ‘Advisory Committee on Ways and Means Advances to State Governments’ constituted by RBI; Advisory Committee on National Accounts Statistics’ constituted by Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation; ‘High Level Committee on Monitoring and Evaluation’ by Ministry of Rural Development, GoI. Dr Bhanumurthy has been the Secretary of the Indian Econometric Society since 2006 and also Managing Trustee of Indian Economic Association Trust for Research and Development since 2010.

 He has received two prestigious awards: Mahalanobis Memorial Medal (National) Award for the year 2014 for his outstanding contributions to the field of quantitative economics in India; and “VKRV Rao Prize in Social Sciences (Economics)” for the year 2015, for high quality research and for significant contributions to social science research in India.

Valedictory Address

Dr. Latha Chari is a Doctorate in Finance from BITS Pilani, Post Graduate in Commerce and a FCMA (Fellow Member of the Institute for Cost Accountants of India). She has an experience of about two decades equally divided between academia and industry. She started her academic career as a Fellow with IILM, Lodhi Road, New Delhi.

Before joining NISM, Dr. Chari has worked with Institute for Technology and Management and ITM Institute of Financial Markets for more than a decade. She joined ITM as lecturer and grew up the hierarchy to become the Deputy Director, heading ITM Institute of Financial Markets. During her academic tenure she has published papers in various national and international journals and has conducted MDPs in the areas of financial asset valuation, strategic cost management, trading and operations in equity markets, performance evaluation of mutual funds and the like.

Dr. Chari’s areas of research interests include strategic cost management, corporate valuations, shareholder value enhancement and similar studies. She has special interests in establishing finance labs and in design, development and delivery of lab based courses in the areas of banking and financial markets.