Chair Emeritus
Govind Nihalani is Plan India’s Chair Emeritus and Goodwill Ambassador. He has been a member of the Board since 2005, including its Chairman for five years. An eminent film director, cinematographer, screenwriter and film producer, he was awarded the Padmashree, a prestigious award by the Government of India, for his contributions to Indian cinema. In the last 35 years, he has received several national and international awards for his work.
President
Ms. Rathi Vinay Jha served in the Indian Administrative Service where as Secretary, Union Ministry of Tourism, she led the team on the ‘Incredible India’ campaign. In her assignment as Director to set up the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) the concept of Fashion Education was introduced for the first time in India. Ms. Jha has also served after retirement as Secretary General of the World Travel and Tourism Council – India. She is the Founder Chairperson of the Indian Heritage Cities Network, a UNESCO NGO. She is on the Boards of a number of other Trusts and Societies addressing the development sector. She is currently the Chairperson of the India Foundation of Arts as well as a Trustee of the Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts. (IGNCA)
Vice President
JVR Prasada Rao joined the Plan India Board in 2015. He was a Special Envoy of UN Secretary General for Asia Pacific until July 2017 and currently the Special Advisor for UNAIDS. He retired as the Secretary of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India and served as Regional Director, UNAIDS, Asia Pacific from 2004-2009. He was the Director General of National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) from 1997-2002 and contributed significantly to establishing India’s AIDS response as a world leader. Mr. Rao has served as Member Secretary of two independent commissions on AIDS in Asia Pacific and is currently a commissioner of the Global Commission on HIV and the Law. He has been a great support to the organisation in the execution of Project Ahana.
Secretary
Atul Kirloskar joined Plan India’s Board in 2017. He began his career in the erstwhile Kirloskar Cummins Ltd. working in various manufacturing departments. After working as CEO of Cummins Diesel Sales and Services, he moved to Kirloskar Oil Engines Ltd. where he is currently their Executive Chairman. Besides this, he is the Chairman of Kirloskar Ferrous Ltd and Kirloskar Industries Ltd. He is a Board Member of Kirloskar Pneumatic Ltd. and has, in the past, served on the board of Bharat Forge Ltd and Bajaj Auto Ltd. He is a member of the World Economic Forum and was the President of the Mahratta Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Agriculture, Pune (2000-2002). He served as the Chairman of the CII National Committee of Defence from 2000 – 2008. His wife, Arti Kirloskar was also a long-standing member of Plan India’s Board, including its Chairperson.
Treasurer
An Economics graduate from Loyola Chennai, Madhukar Kamath studied Management at XLRI Jamshedpur. He has over four decades of experience in Advertising and Marketing Services and has spent close to twenty-five years in erstwhile Mudra, now DDB Mudra Group. Under his leadership, Mudra transformed itself from an Advertising Agency into one of India’s leading Integrated Marketing Communications Groups. In 2011, Madhukar helped Omnicom in acquiring of the Mudra Group and its integration into DDB Worldwide Network. As the Group CEO & MD, for 14 years, he led the group’s aggressive growth agenda – organically and through strategic partnerships/acquisitions. In 2013, Interbrand, the world’s leading brand consultancy also appointed him as Chairman, Interbrand India. He has actively participated in and led several industry bodies. He has served as the President of the AAAI (Advertising Agencies Association of India) and Chairman of ASCI (The Advertising Standards Council of India). He was also the Chairman of AdAsia 2011, India’s largest Marketing Congress, which was held in New Delhi. Currently, he is on the Board of ABC (The Audit Bureau of Circulations) and Music Broadcast India Ltd. (Radio City). He has also served as the Chairman of the Mudra Foundation and the Governing Council of MICA, India’s foremost Business School for Strategic Marketing and Communications Management. Currently, he serves as Chairman Emeritus, DDB Mudra Group and Chairman-Multiplier Mudra. In 2013, he was appointed as an Executive Board member of Plan India.
Board Member
Ajay Kaul in a corporate career spanning 30+ years, served renowned companies like American Express, Lufthansa, TNT (India and Indonesia) and as a CEO of Jubilant FoodWorks (operating Domino’s Pizza and Dunkin’ Donuts in India). He has done his Bachelor of Technology from IIT Delhi and MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur.
Ajay Kaul is the man who fueled India’s voracious appetite for Pizzas, grew Domino’s Pizza (Jubilant FoodWorks) from just 90 stores to 1100 stores during his 12-year stint from 2005 – 2017, making it India’s LARGEST AND FASTEST GROWING FOOD SERVICE COMPANY and LARGEST DOMINO’S PIZZA market in the WORLD! (outside of USA) and his name has become a synonymous with Pizza and Domino’s Pizza in India!!!
Ajay is now working in an advisory capacity with various companies (Everstone Capital Advisors, Domino’s Pizza Indonesia, Burger King India & Indonesia, Chaayos, California Burrito, etc.) having interests in India and abroad. Also, he is actively mentoring a few startups in his personal capacity and through Indian Angel Network, for the past 10 years now.
Additionally, he is a Part of the Isha Leadership Academy team, organizing Leadership Events for CEOs and as a mentor, mentoring several of these CEOs. Adding to his side, he founded Aashrey Charitable Trust to undertake socially responsible work.
Ajay, at an individual level, has been recognized with “Distinguished Alumnus of the Year Award 2014” by XLRI Jamshedpur, “The Outstanding CEO of the year 2014” by CEO India Inc., one of the “Top 100 CEOs in India”, Ernst and Young “Entrepreneur of the Year 2010” and “Professional Leader of the Year 2013”.
His personal interests include Golf, Singing and Social Causes.
Board Member
(Retd.) Justice Madan B. Lokur - Justice Madan B Lokur is a former judge of the Supreme Court of India and presently a judge of the Supreme Court of Fiji. He was appointed as Additional Solicitor General of India in 1998 and a Judge of Delhi High Court in February, 1999. He was the Chief Justice of Gauhati High Court and Chief Justice of the High Court of Andhra Pradesh. He was appointed as a Judge of the Supreme Court on 4th June, 2012 and retired on 30th December, 2018. He was the one-man Committee to suggest improvements in the working of the homes and organisations under the Juvenile Justice Act. He was a member and later Chairperson of the Mediation and Conciliation Project Committee of the Supreme Court, Chairperson of the E-Committee of the Supreme Court and Executive Chairman of the Supreme Court Legal Services Committee and the National Legal Services Authority (NALSA).
Board Member
Ranjan Chak joined the Plan India board in 2011 and serves on the Board’s Marketing and Communication committee and Governance and Nomination committee. After working in the area of Artificial Intelligence in US and Europe, he returned to India in 1987 to help start up Hewlett Packard (India), before building CSSI, his own software product company in New Delhi. Subsequently, in 1994, as Vice President (Indian Operations) for Oracle Corporation, he created one of the most successful offshore software development centres in India. In 2003, he joined Oak Investment Partners as a Venture Partner advising a number of Oak’s global portfolio companies. He currently serves on the advisory board of Vencap International, is a Visiting Fellow of the Judge Business School of Cambridge University, Chairman of the Advisory Board of Oakridge International School, Hyderabad and a founding Director of TEN Innovate Pvt. Ltd.
Board Member
Shireen Jejeebhoy joined Plan India’s Board in 2017. She currently works independently on research and evaluation in the areas of adolescents’ and young people’s health and development, women’s empowerment and gender-based violence, and sexual and reproductive health. She is currently supporting, as Senior Advisor, the organisation Dasra’s monitoring, learning and evaluation activities in the area of adolescent health and wellbeing. She is also guiding the evaluation of UNFPA’s adolescent girls’ programme and provides support to several NGOs in India. Till March 2016, she was Senior Associate at the Population Council, India. Her research has focused on adolescent and young people’s sexual and reproductive health and livelihoods, reproductive health and population and female autonomy and its impact on reproductive health outcomes, especially in India. She has written extensively on young people’s sexual and reproductive health and development, women’s education and empowerment, violence, maternal health, and preventing unsafe abortion. She was a co-PI of the first sub-nationally representative study of young people in India, the Youth in India: Situation and Needs study. She has served on the councils and scientific panels of both the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population and the Asian Population Association.
