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An Education Technology Professional with extensive experience in implementing and monitoring large-scale EdTech initiatives, including DIKSHA and NISHTHA. He focuses on driving reach, adoption, and impact through data, systems strengthening, and capacity building.

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Shri Anurag Kundu is a Member of the Punjab Development Commission (PDC), Government of Punjab, a position equivalent to the Chief Secretary. The Punjab Development Commission serves as the Government’s action-oriented think tank, supporting sound policy design, robust implementation of reforms, and strengthening data, monitoring, and evaluation systems, similar in role to NITI Aayog at the national level.

At PDC, Mr. Kundu leads key portfolios spanning education (early childhood, school, higher and technical education), health and medical services, social welfare (including direct cash transfers and issues related to gender, disability, caste, child protection, and labour welfare), and rural development, water and sewerage systems. His work focuses on driving systemic reform, improving service delivery, and ensuring that policy translates into measurable outcomes for citizens.

Previously, he served as Chairperson of the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR), where he led initiatives on child protection, education, and welfare in close coordination with government and civil society.

With deep experience in public policy, education reform, and child rights, Mr. Kundu is known for his system-oriented approach to translating policy vision into meaningful on-ground impact. His work reflects a strong commitment to equity, inclusion, and long-term institutional reform.

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Bindu Thirumalai is an education researcher, teacher educator, and thought leader with over twenty-six years of experience across academic, development, government, and corporate sectors. Her work focuses on strengthening teacher professional development at scale through action research, technology-enabled learning, curriculum design, and meaningful partnerships within public education systems. She has designed and led blended learning programs, MOOCs, and statewide teacher capacity-building initiatives and contributed extensively to policy, research, and OER development. With a strong grounding in both education and technology, she brings a unique interdisciplinary perspective to advancing equitable, contextually grounded, and future-ready teacher education in India. She is currently an adjunct faculty at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru. 

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Shri Chandra Prakash Bhakuni is a Senior Social Empowerment Fellow for School Operations at APSWREIS (Andhra Pradesh Social Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society), with over a decade of hands-on experience in the public education system. An alumnus of BITS Pilani and Azim Premji University, he has worked closely with SCERT Delhi on its flagship programs such as the Entrepreneurship Mindset Curriculum and large-scale online capacity building programs. In his current role at APSWREIS, he focuses on data-informed academic monitoring and building meaningful knowledge partnerships that are helping residential schools to become vibrant, effective, and future-ready.

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Dr. David M. Nongrum is the Associate Professor, Directorate of Educational Research & Training (DERT), Government of Meghalaya, a member of NCERT team for drafting national Evaluation Guidelines for Indian School Boards, State team member for UNESCO’s General Education Quality Analysis/Diagnosis Framework, and Chairperson, Focus Group on Curriculum & Pedagogy, Meghalaya State Curriculum Framework. He has led drafting of Meghalaya State Education Policy (2018), approved by the State Cabinet, conceptualised and piloted the Meghalaya School Improvement Programme (MSIP), developed the School Quality Assessment & Accreditation Framework for Meghalaya, Nodal Officer of DIKSHA and CM Impact – Class Readiness Programme (2025).

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Smt Girija B H is the Deputy Director of Public Instruction (DDPI) for the School Improvement Studies and Educational Technology Cell at the Department of State Educational Research and Training (DSERT) Government of Karnataka. She brings over two decades of experience in education administration, academic planning, pedagogy, and curriculum implementation. With leadership experience at both district and state levels, she has been instrumental in strengthening ICT curriculum initiatives and advancing digital literacy across Karnataka. Her work focuses on integrating technology with pedagogy, supporting effective curriculum implementation, and driving system-wide digital transformation within the public education system.

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Smt Jevika Kiba is currently serving as the District Education Officer, Nagaland, who has a rich experience of working closely with students, teachers, and parents over the years, as a Teacher, an AHM, HM, Asstt. Director and Sr. SDEO. What really distinguishes her is how she has always believed in understanding voices from the ground – the catalyst to bring change in Nagaland’s Education landscape.

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Smt Kalyani Nandyala , in 2014, joined the Government of Telangana and has since been serving in the School Education Department with distinction. Currently, she serves with Samagra Shiksha as Academic Monitoring Officer (Gender& Prahari clubs) and State Coordinator for Prahari Clubs. Her key areas of work include the Adolescent Safety and Empowerment Programme (ASEP) and Drug Abuse Prevention initiatives in government schools. She has been instrumental in designing student-centric safety modules, establishing peer leadership platforms, and implementing large-scale awareness programmes across the state to build safe, empowered, and drug-free school environments. Her work focuses on strengthening adolescent well-being, fostering student leadership, and creating sustainable school-based prevention systems through collaboration between government, schools, and community organisations.

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Smt Manju Phukan believes in innovative practices to help the learners to learn , like utilizing library as learning resource, setting Happy Corners in Schools for Social/ emotional development of learners etc. She has been involved in various works as assigned by the DSCERT, mainly in teacher training on Adolescence Education, Life skill education , Training in Guidance and Counselling in School Education and Action Research: Why/ how to be carried out in Schools etc.

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Priya Iyer currently designs and implements holistic curricula enabling young people to engage in deep learning and thrive in complex and changing contexts. Her work spans large-scale educational programs developed in close collaboration with government bodies and civil society organizations. With over 30 years of experience across NGO-run schools, institutions serving tribal and disadvantaged communities, and the university sector, she has worked in diverse capacities as a teacher, researcher, and school leader. She has led and supported the design and development of 10 schools across different regions of India, integrating equity, contextual relevance, and learner-centered pedagogy.

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Ram leads a distributed team that enables the Teach For India Alumni community in our 8 regions to work together, innovate and improve life outcomes for children from low-income families. Prior to this, Ram has worked in a number of roles across our city and national teams, building collaborative ecosystems and partnerships for educational equity. He is an engineer from the National Institute of Technology Karnataka, and has helped found two start-ups in Bangalore, before joining Teach For India as a Fellow in 2013. He is passionate about network theory, entrepreneurship in education and believes in the power of social movements to effect systems change.

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Ram Kamal is a distinguished mass communication professional, international journalist, and social engineering expert with decades of global experience across leading English newspapers and news agencies. He is the Publisher and Editor of Diversity, a parenting magazine for families of children with different abilities. Since 2010, he has focused on advancing accessibility and inclusive education, contributing to assistive technology design and policy shaping in India and internationally. A co-founder of Chakshumathi (Intuitive Mind), he works closely with global technology leaders to enable digital accessibility. Currently, he serves as Principal Advisor to Samagra Shiksha Andhra Pradesh, leading statewide transformation in inclusive education through digitally accessible pedagogy.

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Sanjana is the Co-founder of Ground Zero, where she leads operations and strategy and works with 150+ nonprofits and impact organisations across India and South Asia on leadership and critical talent hiring. Drawing from hundreds of senior and leadership hires annually, she brings data-backed insights on how the social sector’s talent landscape is shifting—growing openness to cross-sector leaders, younger professionals moving into leadership, sharper expectations on execution and outcomes, and a gradual but visible push toward gender-diverse leadership pipelines.

Prior to Ground Zero, Sanjana led partnerships at the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT), managing collaborations across 24 priority countries in the Asia-Pacific region, and has worked with organisations like Quest Alliance, Shibulal Philanthropic Initiatives, Mantra4change, and Ashoka Innovators for the Public. She brings a combination of hiring data, ecosystem-wide perspective, and a strong point of view on how investing in young and women leaders can unlock innovation and strengthen programme delivery in the social sector.

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Dr Urvashi Sahni is an educationist, social entrepreneur, and a leading voice in girls’ rights and feminist pedagogy in India. She is the President and CEO of the Study Hall Educational Foundation (SHEF), which delivers quality, rights-based education to thousands of girls from marginalised communities. As Co-founder of Catalyst 2030, she also helps convene global social innovators to accelerate systems change. Over four decades, her work has influenced national education policy, strengthened government partnerships, and advanced community-driven models of schooling. She is recognised internationally for developing scalable approaches that nurture agency, critical thinking, and leadership among girls, transforming both classrooms and communities.

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Smt Vani R K is the Senior Assistant Director of Public Instruction (S.A.D.P.I) in the e-Content section at the Department of State Educational Research and Training (DSERT), Government of Karnataka. She has over 20 years of experience across teaching, research, and higher education. Her work spans curriculum development, academic research, and teacher professional development, with a strong focus on system-level academic support. She has been actively involved in digitisation efforts in the state and has played a key role in the research-led adoption and scaling of DIKSHA, contributing to e-content development, technology-enabled teaching and learning in line with DSERT’s academic mandate

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