Dharmendra Pradhan is an Indian politician serving as the Minister of Education and Minister of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship in the Government of India. He has also been the Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas and Minister of Steel. Shri Pradhan currently represents Madhya Pradesh in the Rajya Sabha as Member of Parliament.

Dr C. N. Ashwathnarayan is an Indian politician, who on August 04th 2021, was inducted as the Cabinet Minister in Bharatiya Janata Party Government led by Chief minister BS Bommai. He is currently Minister of Higher Education, Information Technology & Biotechnology and Science & Technology, Skill Development, Entrepreneurship, and Livelihood in the Government of Karnataka. He is a Member of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly representing BJP from the Malleshwaram constituency, Bangalore, Karnataka. He also served as 10th Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka.. He is a multifaceted personality and a firm believer in technology, Dr. C. N. Ashwathnarayan is an educationist, healthcare entrepreneur and philanthropist.

The positions he held include Convener of Doctors Cell – Bharatiya Janata Party and Founder President of Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences, Bangalore. He was also the Vice President of Bharatiya Janata Party, Bangalore District, Senate Member of Bangalore University, Syndicate and Senate Member of Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences Employees Association, Bangalore, and the Chairman of Commitiee for drating statutes for A&B, C&D cadre of employees of Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences, Bangalore.

Dr. Ashwathnarayan has enabled introduction of Health Insurance Schemes, Pension Scheme for Widows, Handicaps and Senior Citizens, Day Care Centre for Senior Citizens, Seva Kendra’s in each ward. Also Hasiru Santhe, Zero Garbage, Waste Recycle, Modernizing Old Establishments, Development of Parks, Gymnasiums and Aerobics Centers.

On August 04th 2021 he was inducted as the Cabinet Minister in Bharatiya Janata Party Government led by Chief minister BS. Bommai

Kiruba Shankar is CEO of Business Blogging & founder Director of F5ive Technologies. He has 24 years of work experience in the Internet space and helps craft digital strategies for large firms. He has consulted for leading brands such as British Council, Dominos Pizza, Murugappa Group, Mahindra Group, Sterling Holidays, Larsen & Toubro and The Hindu Newspaper Group.
Kiruba is the President of the Professional Speakers Association. As a global professional speaker specializing in Digital Excellence and Digital Selling, he has delivered over 700 talks at conferences and corporate events across 21 countries. More about him as a speaker at www.Kiruba.Pro.
He has authored five books and has been a technology columnist for newspapers such as Business Standard, Financial Express and The New Indian Express.
Kiruba has been teaching for 18 years and is a Professor of Digital Marketing. He has taught at leading B-Schools.
In the weekends, Kiruba heads to his village where he passionately pursues organic farming at Vaksana Farms, his 13 acre farm.

Arjun Mohan is the CEO-India, at upGrad, South Asia’s largest online higher edtech. Arjun started his career with the Think & Learn Pvt Ltd, commonly known as Byju’s, as a teacher and moved up the ranks into a leadership role. He ran most of the Sales and Marketing in the company’s early years and was until recently running its International Business. He held several leadership positions throughout his tenure including Vice President - Marketing and most recently, Chief Business Officer (CBO).
Prior to Byju’s, Arjun drove Sales and Operations at Titan Industries and did his stints with Tata Motors, Tata Realty and Infrastructure Ltd. (TRIL) and Sir Dorabji Tata and Allied Trusts. He started his career as a Tata Administrative Services Manager after passing out from IIM Kozhikode with Gold Medal.

John is a Technology Leader with wide ranging experience in public and private sector. His technical expertise span process, technology, data, analytics, and digital transformation areas, primarily focusing on Financial Services Industry. He has hands on experience in modern data architecture, data science and data governance. John has led both strategy and business transformation engagements involving big data, cloud data platforms (GCP, AWS and Azure), machine learning, data warehousing, reporting, data visualization and analytics. He has helped banks transform their operating models and capabilities in functions such as Marketing, CRM, Product/Pricing, Compliance, Risk, Fraud and Operations.
Having worked across 3 continents in leadership roles across banks, technology product startups, technology services and management consulting firms (including big 4) , John brings to bear a holistic set of capabilities and perspectives in technology strategy, business and technology architecture, technology delivery, business transformation and change management. More recently John has held Technology Leadership roles with the Government of Kerala including leadership roles in Kerala State IT parks and Kerala Startup Mission.
John holds an MBA from Georgia Tech, Atlanta and Bachelor’s in Mechanical Engineering from National Institute of Technology, Calicut.

An entrepreneur and the brain behind TutorComp, Shery Kurian’s passion drives the company and the team to attain greater heights. Shery started his career from Cambridge, and during his academic years he realized the necessity of additional help to score well in the subjects. Over the years of groundwork and various interactions with parents and educators, Shery understood the deep requirement for supplemental help where students can get access to education in a more simplified and efficient way.

Over the past few decades, the global economy has shifted from being manufacturing-centric to a knowledge-driven one and as countries move up the ladder of development, the contributions of high value-added services to the GDP increases. The emergence of India as a servicebased, knowledge driven economy has put the spot light on human capital. Hence, the higher quality of university education is the key to sustainable development of a country. How relevant is the University providing higher education depends extensively on the people who create and run it.
Dr. Chenraj Roychand, a distinguished Indian educationist, entrepreneur, angel investor and philanthropist with over 39 years of experience, is the Founder Chairman of the Jain Group which is growing at 25% CAGR.
Fruitful journey of a Visionary
Dr. Roychand embarked his journey as a salesman earning 50 rupees per month at Bombay Dyeing showroom, to becoming the No.1 dealer under Reliance banner in South India. Eventually, inspired by Swami Vivekananda, Dhirubhai Ambani he realized knowledge is the future which is critical to make people stand on their own feet. This philosophy inspired him to establish Jain College in 1990 with the aim of providing quality education to the students. This also marked the beginning of his journey with education which led to starting many more colleges and schools. Today the group successfully operates 77 educational institutions with more than 72000 students from 43 countries and 10,000 employees engaged at the K-12, undergraduate, postgraduate and research levels spread across 64 campuses pan India.
Dr. Chenraj Roychand, the exemplary Edupreneur
Dr. Roychand‟s vision to generate a culture of educational excellence has led to the development of numerous successful educational institutions like JAIN (Deemed-to-be University), Jain Colleges, Jain International Residential School, Jain Heritage Schools, Jain Public Schools and Jain Toddlers. Among these “JAIN (Deemed-to-be University) has attained prominence. The University is granted graded autonomy status by University Grants Commission and ranked consistently among the top universities in India by India Today Nielsen Best Universities Survey. JAIN (Deemed-to-be University) is a member of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) and the Association of Universities of Asia and the Pacific (AUAP). The University has MoUs with prestigious organizations, educational institutes of global repute. Underwriters Laboratories, University of Bolton, University of Exeter, Forum of Federations, Yunus Social Business Center are a few among them. The University offers new-age careerready programs from Galileo-iNurture i.e. MBA in Sport Management, Luxury Management, Hospitality Management which are exclusively designed by French industry professionals who have mastered in their area of specialization. The Design School (D – School) launched by the University unleashes the creativity of the students through innovative approaches to design education.
Along with creating educational opportunities, Dr. Chenraj also initiated angel-investing firms, which provide the platform for youngsters to become entrepreneurs. His passion for entrepreneurship started from a very young age. Inspired by Dr. Ambani, in 1982, he started 800 retail outlets with an innovative concept in display that required lesser investment, which is now popular as "Bits" showrooms. Today, more than 30,000 shops exist under the same concept. Dr. Roychand has also been instrumental in mentoring more than 3000 students and incubating 56 companies. He adopts both traditional and modern approaches to inculcate entrepreneurial zeal and transform their business ideas into successful enterprises. The 56 incubation units that consists of 25 SMEs with a combined turnover of 3000 million and 31 selfoperated companies with a turnover of 5 million each at Jain Group have helped to create employment for 2000 people. He along with one of our entrepreneurs is associated with BlockchainNext OU, a registered company in Estonia, Europe which is a unicorn in the making that owns and has developed Tyche Ecosystem. The project BlockchainNeXT is an umbrella architecture to connect existing and future blockchains. TycheCash, TychExchange, TycheCard and TycheGate are a few of the projects under development in the construction. Dr. Chenraj Roychand has also conceived a unique and high-value 2 years program which combines academic and applied aspects of entrepreneurship, ranging from enterprise development, capital formation, policy creation, product analysis, to strategy building. He is also instrumental in setting up JUx, an online learning platform that will create $20 million turnover in the next two years. Dr. Roychand is also planning to start 100 Jain Colleges across India under the banner Jain Skills.
As Mohandas Pai, Chairman of Manipal Global Education, puts it across, “He is the Indian version of an angel investor with a lot of mentoring and support, where you treat it as a family business and the entrepreneur becomes part of the family. It is not like the Western model of high growth and high return. Here, the person who is mentoring is more important than the investment.”
His perseverance has resulted in educational and entrepreneurial institutions of unparalleled stature, both in terms of infrastructure and personnel. His commitment to faculty development at Jain Group is indubitable. He encourages and extends his support to his faculty by mentoring, advising, and guiding them to adopt innovative teaching methods in order to address the needs of diverse populations, engage students in critical and higher-order thinking.
A true Philanthropist for the community and beyond
A firm practitioner of philanthropy, Dr. Chenraj Roychand started a nation building exercise in the form of Jain Vidyaniketan in Kanakapura (Karnataka). Jain Vidyaniketan is a school offering free education and full facilities to underserved children from 180 villages at an annual expenditure of 35 million. Till date, more than 8000 students have benefited with free education at a cost of $2000 million. 20 Jain Public Schools in semi-urban cities also providing subsidies fees facilities for more than 15000 students. He is involved in meaningful welfare driven and meticulously conceived projects focusing on health care, education, sustainable livelihood, infrastructure and social causes that distinctively impact the quality of life.
For instance, blood donation camps, health checkups, medical facilities and preventive care awareness in addition to the free distribution of clothes to a large number of school children, every year, has been some of his attempts for a better world, the world of his visions and dreams.
Radioactive CR 90.4 MHz, Bangalore‟s first community radio station licensed to Jain University was launched by Dr. Roychand to reach out to Bangalore‟s masses on issues concerning health, environment, development, scientific awareness, women, social issues etc, in turn seeking to inform, educate, while entertaining the public.
He institutionalized sports in the Jain Group, and encouraged excellence by supporting talented athletes to fulfil their dreams by providing adequate academic support. Jain Group has produced 6 Olympians, 1 Paralympian, more than 200 national and international sportspersons till date. India‟s firs of its kind “The Sports School” in partnership with marquee academies is underway to open new avenues to the sports aspirants.
Accolades for being an epitome of true leadership
Dr. Roychand‟s contribution towards social responsibility initiatives and his profound inspirational aura has earned him numerous awards, titles and recognitions. The several accolades won for his exemplary work in the sphere of education and social service include, Rotary Award for Vocational Service, Dr. B C Roy Award from Indian Medical Association Award for Leading Personalities, SEVAK Award for Service to Humanity, Rajasthan Youth Association Award for Service in Education Sector, Seva Ratna Award awarded by Centurion Trust, Chennai for his individual contribution to society, Kempegowda Award for remarkable contribution in the field of education, etc. He was conferred the Degree of Doctor of Literature (Honoris Causa) for his contribution to social work, education and philanthropy by the Mangalore University, Karnataka. He is also the governing board member of prestigious Institute of Rural Development Management Anand (IRMA).

An academic Administrator, teacher, consultant, trainer, speaker and academic entrepreneur, for 10 years Dr. Raj Singh has been the Vice Chancellor of Ansal University Gurugram, Rayat-Bahra University (RBU) Mohali, G. D. Goenka University, Gurugram, Amity University Madhya Pradesh, Gwalior and Amity University, Jaipur (Dual-Charge). Before that he was Pro-Vice Chancellor at Amity University NOIDA for 5 years, Director General of the prestigious Amity Business School and founding HEAD of ICFAI Business School (IBS) New Delhi from inception in 1995. He served the Indian Air Force from 1981 to 1994.
Since January 2020, he has been advisor and consultant to 5 Universities across India including JAIN University. With Masters in Economics, a Qualified CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) and PhD in Strategic Finance, he has over 39 years of experience. A TEDx speaker, Dr. Singh is known for his oratory skills and innovative approach in Higher Education.
He has been a trainer and consultant both Indian and Multinational companies like Tata’s, Air India, TCIL (Telecom Consultants of India Ltd.), Denso India, ANZ Grindlays, NTPC, GAIL, SAIL and has trained over 4000 teachers in schools as well as higher education.
Widely travelled, and a visiting Professor at IIT-Delhi (Management Department) and Delhi School of Economics, he has been on advisory boards of many Institutions and Universities, Education Promotion Society for India (EPSI) and was the Vice Chairman of Quality Committee on Education of QCI, Govt. of India. He regularly chairs the expert committees of National Board of Accreditation (NBA) and was member of the first Governing Council of the Rajasthan Science Congress, member of CSIE (Council of Skilled India Entrepreneurship), member of HE Committee of FICCI-North India.
He has been conferred Awards for exemplary Education Leadership in 2012, 2016 and 2017. He will be conferred with Peter Drucker Memorial Award of Excellence on November 19, 2020 for his contribution to Management Education.

As the CEO of ConduiraOnline, Sasank leads the organization in helping the students build their dream careers. An alumnus of IIIT Hyderabad and IIM-Calcutta, he co-founded Conduira after a stint at ITC Ltd. Sasank has 15+ years of experience in mentoring students and building digital products to help students achieve their career aspirations.

An alumnus of La Martiniere College, Lucknow, Siddharth Banerjee is an experienced consumer & technology global business leader, a digital evangelist, and an award-winning marketer. He has over 21+ years of international business experience and has lived & worked across India, Singapore, the UK & Sri Lanka.
Siddharth is currently the Managing Director for Pearson, with a mandate to strengthen Pearson’s direct-to-consumer (D2C) strategy and digital proposition in India, and to build a direct relationship with the Higher Education ecosystem across the Asia region. Prior to this role, he was the CRO & Global CMO at Games24x7 helping build a 21st century scientific Gaming Company out of India and was previously part of the Leadership Team at Facebook India as the Country Director- Global Sales Organisation (GSO). Prior to Facebook, he was the EVP-Marketing at Vodafone India and led a global Vodafone business accelerator unit (mWomen) across 12 markets in Asia-Africa.
In the first 15 years of his career, Siddharth has built a strong foundation in the CPG / FMCG industry with most of his business and leadership experience forged at HUL / Unilever. He is actively involved in the Internet Ecosystem in India. He was on the Investment Advisory Committee at KStart (Kalaari’s Seed Fund) and is currently on the board of select industry associations and organizations. He is also an angel investor in new-age Media & D2C CPG start-ups and a mentor for early-stage Tech founders.
Siddharth holds B.A. Economics (Honours) and M.B.A degrees from the University of Delhi. He has coupled this with executive education from ISB Hyderabad / IIM-A and the Harvard Business School. He is a National Talent Scholar (NTSE) and a Chevening Fellow at the University of Oxford.
Siddharth is the bestselling co-author of Speechless and 52RedPills, a regular at Marketing Jury Panels & a top-ranked Keynote speaker at industry conferences across APAC. He is a big believer in hyper-learning & has co-founded www.52RedPills.com with his wife, Eika Chaturvedi Banerjee.

Teresa Jacobs is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors, Educational Business Developer, Director of Quality Assurance with significant experience in Assessment Development and Quality and Process Management in both professional. Teresa managed Pearson Edexcel ELT testing provision before moving on to on the construction of assessments for statutory license to practice initiatives.
Teresa then proudly worked for Chartered Institute of Management (CIMA) as Head of QA,while also take lead responsibility and driving companywide external QA recognition for CIMA, using the EFQM model.
She then moved across to the delivery side of Higher Education (HE) and discovered an additional passion - the Contribution QA can bring to an acquisitive private sector HE provider. Teresa was the driving force behind a successful entry for the Queen’s Award for Enterprise. She then moved to Institute of Directors (IoD), UK where she transformed the assessments and their delivery methodology. The IoD became the first professional body to fully adopt remote invigilation. Not only adept at providing a strategic overview and developing and implementing policies and processes but also skilled at business development and project management to enter new educational markets with HE partners. An innovative and proactive approach to problem solving accompanied by a passion for excellence and ability drive efficiency, quality and profit.
Currently Teresa serves the position of Executive Director - Learning at ISDC and also, she continues to support innovation in education. This year she headed the judging panel for an industry award in transformational change.

Tom Joseph is a self-driven edupreneur and has been an active profile in the Education and Training industry in India and abroad for a decade. He is leading the new Initiatives at Jain University. His responsibilities include the design and development of new education products, sustainable education processes, market & brand strategies for the group. He has proven his skills for designing innovative education & skill development models, physical & digital education infrastructure creation, national & international branch campuses, sustainable M&A Practices in the Education Sector.
Tom works as a part of Senior Leadership Team at JAIN to ensure the right strategies for the group to keep the brand being timely relevant. He has educated from the United Kingdom and holds many professional body memberships; also sits at the Advisory and Governing Councils of many Universities & Professional Bodies.

Saiju Aravind is the Founder & Chief Mentor of EduBrisk Knowledge Solutions. EduBrisk is a powerful AI/ML-based Digital Learning process oriented Platform based on the principle of BUILDTM , a synergistic blend of Neurophysiology, Computer Science, Pedagogy & Andragogy and Cognitive Psychology. The Platform has gained popularity in India and the Middle East over the last few years empowering over 1 Lakh students and 8000 teachers in K12 Segment.
Saiju is a Post Graduate from IIT Delhi. He worked as a Senior Scientist at the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Government of India, after serving as Commander in the Indian Navy and is a member of the Institute of Defence Scientists & Technologists (IDST). He is a recipient of several awards like the ‘Commodore Garg Silver Medal’ at IIT, Delhi, 'Tukral Memorial Award’, Chief of Naval Staff Commendation, etc. to name a few. Saiju has also taught Hydrodynamics and related subjects to B. Tech and M. Tech Students of CUSAT and Andhra University. He has also guided several M. Tech Thesis in the field of Naval Architecture and Hydrodynamics. His contributions to science and technology are available in the form of over 15 international papers in Science & Technology.
Saiju’s relentless quest to make quality learning easy and affordable has garnered notice and appreciation from various parts of the world . Invited speaker at National Institute of Advance studies, Bangalore ( NIAS/IISC) and keynote speaker 31st CBSE Principals’ conference , other international educational conventions and a writer with scholarly articles in academic and popular papers, Saiju’s efforts have won him the Cochin Herald‘s Business Excellence and Leadership Awards, 2017, International Achiever‘s Conference Award for the Best fastest-growing Company in India, Bangkok, 2017, Indywood Education Excellence Awards, 2017 and many more. TieCon , Kerala Chapter’s prestigious 'Startup Entrepreneur of the Year 2018' award is the latest in a line of international and national awards that have been conferred on. Instrumental in aligning with NEP 2020 framework and goals in various schools.
Saiju is in a mission to empower 1 million underprivileged students with state of art technology and learning principles.

I am Jaya Nagarajan, Principal of Hari Sri Vidya Nidhi School, Punkunnam, Thrissur.
I have been an English teacher for the past 3 decades and more. My career as a teacher began in Hari Sri Vidya Nidhi in the year 1990. I have taught both English & History and Civics at the High School level. As the years passed by I rose in rank and was appointed the Principal in the year 2014. I have had a challenging and fulfilling 7 years as head of this institution.
Hari Sri Vidya Nidhi School was founded by Mrs.Nalini Chandran in the year 1978. Today Mrs.Chandran is the Executive Director of this institution. We are a well reputed institution known for our discipline, co-curricular activities and good spoken English.

Aditi Chatterjee is a New-Age educationist with three decades of experience in the field of education. She is someone who believes that "the learning environment must be one of fun and not fear".
She has been working in Kerala for the past three years and is now serving as the director of research and innovation at the Silver Hills Institutions, Kozhikode.
Earlier, she was the academic dean of Silver Hills Public School.
A pragmatist to the core, Chatterjee's areas of expertise include classroom resource management, curriculum planning, policy implementation and pupil motivation. Over the years, she has also proved herself to be an excellent communicator and problem solver.
"Working with young minds always fascinates me. There is so much wonder and eagerness to discover the World in the eyes of students. Patience and the willingness to listen has always drawn students closer to me. I come across more as a friend and facilitator than authority. I prefer to model & practice the virtues that I would want others to emulate than just talk about them. Honesty, sincerity, perseverance and punctuality are an integral part of me," she says about her approach towards education.
Before coming to Kerala for her second stint in the state, she worked as the dean of academics at Tagore International School, East of Kailash, New Delhi. Before that, she served as an education counsellor at Delhi Public School, RK Puram freelance trainer and educator at Harper Collins and Oxford University Press. She also has international experience in school education in the USA and Singapore.

Muhammed Rashid is the Founder and CEO of Codesap Technologies LLP, which is a prominent startup from Kerala. Rashid has formulated the company from his early years of college and fully developed and launched it as a student startup project under Kerala startup mission. Codesap technologies has brought one of the most  advanced Edutech platform for educational institutions, Edusap - an interactive intelligent institution management application that is marked as one of the finest Edutech platform which has a good number of client base pan India.

Dr.Manoj is a Founding Director of Directorate of Online Education, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE). He has over 23 years of experience in online teaching, research and academic administration. He was instrumental in establishing the Directorate of Online Education at MAHE and popularizing MAHE online programs in African countries via Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) PanAfrican Network Project. He has expertise in design, development and delivery of distance & online programs. He spearheaded e-Learning projects involving development of e-Tutorials and virtual labs for various Health Science & Management programs.
Dr.Manoj has conducted several training programs for teachers on effective online teaching and learner engagement using online platforms. As a consultant for Manipal Global Education Services (MaGE), he was instrumental in designing customised boot camps and workshops for corporates such as Philips, Deloitte, GE Healthcare and Heinz. As an advisor, he helps institutions in accreditation, teacher training, curriculum design, development and delivery.
While his core expertise is online education, Dr.Manoj also has profound interest in institutional accreditation and ranking. He has expertise in preparing institutions for NAAC, DEAC and NBA accreditations. He is an IRCA certified Lead Auditor for ISO 9001:2015 and CII Certified Lead Assessor for 5S-Workplace Management System.
He has published several research papers in national and international journals, and presented his research findings at various national and international conferences. He has also published articles on various aspects of health and environment in newspapers. He has visited Volda University, Norway as a visiting faculty and is a member of Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC), Philippines and International Council for Open & Distance Education (ICDE), Norway.

Joyal Joseph Joy, a Btech graduate from college of engineering Trivandum and together with my partner founded an edutech startup called Teacherind in 2020.
Our startup was formed during our college days when we saw the pain point of no sufficient quality education avenues available for the engineering students outside of the college lectures. So we started out to function in our college and expanded into other colleges and schools as well in a matter of a few months.
Our tutor team consists of over 100 active tutors selected from a pool of tutors through earn while learn clubs. We also have a marketing team with digital marketers and field executives across Kerala for School outreaches. Our office and our technical wing are headquartered at CET Technological Business Incubator, College of Engineering Trivandrum, Kerala Startup Mission.