Vice-Chair

Ms. Aparna Sahay

Ms. Aparna Sahay has MA in Political Science and an MBA. She had a long career in civil services in the GoR (Rajasthan Accounts Services). Her major assignments were Member Secretary- Rajasthan State Women's Commission; Director- Lok Jumbish Project; Consultant- Swedish International Development Authority on Reproductive & Child Health; State Coordinator- The Hunger Project; ED, RTDC & Financial Advisor- RIICO. She retired in 2015 as Registrar and Addl. Director, Centre for Management Studies, HCM Raj. State Institute of Public Administration. She also headed SANDHAAN- an NGO working in education.

Member

Ms. Girija Srinivasan

Ms. Srinivasan is a development finance and rural livelihoods expert with 30+ years of experience in development banking, consulting, technical assistance and studies. Earlier as a development banker, she had taken to consulting working with a wide variety of international and national organizations. She authored books on community-based approaches in development finance and livelihoods. She authored Social Performance Report in mF (2011-14). She co-authored SOIL Report 2015 & 2016 with N. Srinivasan. She serves on the board of FWWB and industry forums on livelihoods and development finance.

Member Secretary

Ms. Malika Srivastava

Ms. Malika Srivastava is the Executive Director of the Centre for microFinance (CmF). She has been working with the CmF since 2007 on behalf of the Tata Trusts in various capacities and specializes in Community Based Microfinance & Rural Livelihoods. Malika holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Rural Management from the Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA). She holds a B.Tech. in the Dairy Technology. Before joining the CmF in 2007, she has worked for around 2 years in Andhra Pradesh (now Telangana state) to promote the farmers’ cooperatives. She has been the Executive Director of CmF since November 2015.

Member

Mr. P.V.S. Suryakumar

Mr. P.V.S. Suryakumar is an expert in agriculture and rural development, with 36+ years of experience, primarily at National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development, where he served as Deputy Managing Director. His work spans project appraisal, rural infrastructure, natural resource management, and policy advocacy. He has Master’s in Plant Genetics (IARI, New Delhi) and Sustainable Development (Staffordshire University). He is an Associate of the Indian Institute of Banking & Finance and the author of two books, Cases: How to Write & Use Them and Sustainable Agriculture.

Ex Officio Member

Dr. Sanjiv Phansalkar

Dr. Sanjiv Phansalkar completed his PGP (in 1979) and Fellowship Program from IIM Ahmedabad in 1989. He taught for about 11 years at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand. He led the IWMI-Tata Water Policy Program during 2005-7. He was Program Director at Tata Trusts during 2007-2018. He led the research team at Vikasanvesh Foundation from 2018 through 2024. Currently he works as Head Programs at Tata Trusts. He has published 10 books, over 3 dozen research articles and a large number of popular articles mostly dealing with rural livelihoods and rural development.

Member

Ms. Vartika Jaini

Ms. Vartika Jaini is a development professional with PGDRM (IRMA), Chevening Fellow from Kings College, London and currently the director of Vriddhi Rural Prosperity Services Ltd which offers services that accelerate the process of change for marginalized communities, particularly women farmers in Central India. She is involved with the Group Relations India – an institution for advancing group relations methodology. She started her career with Sir Ratan Tata Trust in 1999 and helped develop a diverse portfolio of projects focused on microfinance, rural livelihoods, youth & organization development. She was closely associated with the setting up of CmF.

Member

Mr. Vipin Sharma

Mr. Vipin Sharma is the founding CEO of ACCESS, set up in 2006. Starting his career with the Reserve Bank of India, he has 35+ years of experience in banking, agriculture and rural development, micro enterprise development and microfinance in varied institutions including NABARD, Rural Non- Farm Development Agency (RUDA), Govt of Rajasthan and CARE India. As Executive Director of RUDA, he helped the Govt of Rajasthan to develop strategies for promoting non-farm sector in the state through a sub-sector approach. At CARE, he was the Program Director of the Microfinance Unit and a part of the Regional Leadership Team.