Advisors

Niranjan Khatri

Niranjan Khatri currently serves as the General Manager (GM) at Environment Initiatives of ITC hotels. Mr. Khatri has background in Hotel Management and wealthy experience of working as GM at various ITC Hotels. To his credit, he pioneered the concept of eco designing inITCBayIslandin Port Blair during 1988 to 1992; Travel House in 1992 to 1994 and Land base India Ltd. during 1994 to 1996. He submitted a paper to ILO/ Cornell University on eco-designing in 1994. He headed Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) Renewable Energy Cell for a year during 1996 to 1997. He has developed eco-rating for Delhi Government which has been distributed to over 1200 schools, translated into Marathi & further distributed to 6000 schools inMaharashtra.

Mr. Khatri was Ex-faculty member of the Railway Staff College, Baroda and conducted 30 sessions on eco-designing for senior management of the Indian Railways. He conducted sessions for many public/private sector companies like BHEL, CEL, Tata BP Solar, Wipro and Karnataka Pollution Control Board / Power Finance Corporation, IIT, MDI, SP Jain & many chambers of commerce.

Mr. Khatri was the Ex-convener of the water committee of CII Delhi council and of the power & water committee of CII northern region/national committee respectively.

Mr. Khatri is the ex Chairperson of Sustainable Development Committee of Federation of Hotels and Restaurants Association of India-Western Region and a member of Arunim & National Trust- an arm of Ministry of social justice. He initiated innovative DNA embedded social investment programme in ITC hotels. He served as a Non-Executive Director in Central Electronics Ltd. for 5 years.

Mr. Khatri is the recipient of Helen Keller Award in 2006 & in 2011; Karmaveer Puraskar 2009; Green Hotelier award 2010 & Parivartan Sustainability Leadership Award 2012.

Ravi Pillai

Ravi Pillai is presently Director, Pelican Educational Resources Pvt. Ltd. Prior to this, Mr. Pillai was the President (Schools) and President (Educational Joint Ventures and Partnerships) at Educomp Solutions Limited for approximately 3 years until October 2011. Ravi’s major stint was with City and Guilds, headquartered in the United Kingdom with subsidiaries across the world, where he served as the Regional Head and Country Director, City and Guilds (South Asia) with responsibility for SAARC countries served from 1999 to 2009.

During his professional career, Mr. Pillai has been actively engaged in setting up, promoting, product positioning for employability outcomes and embedding of concepts, principles and processes related to nurturing the growth of livelihood options and establishment of City and Guilds products and offerings which help nurture the growth livelihood and work ready youth in South Asia.

Mr. Pillai structured and built the City and Guilds organisation from scratch in the subcontinent. As the largest provider of Vocational Education in the UK and the largest Awarding body in the world, City and Guilds established a strong presence in all the countries of the region as a reliable provider of solutions, qualifications and certifications across a range of work sectors.

Mr. Pillai has also been engaged with advising and consulting with Director General of Employment and Training (DGE&T) in the Ministry of Labour in the design of schemes, skill development initiatives and design, development and implementation of the Modular Employment Scheme introduced by the Union Ministry of Labour during his stint in City & Guilds.

Mr. Pillai represents on the Apex Committee of the Ministry of Labour for selection of Assessing bodies. He is also a member of the Technical Advisory Committee set up by the Institute of Applied Manpower Research for the validation of the National Skill Development Initiative, the Apprenticeship scheme and consults with the Ministry with regard to structure and body of skill projects.

Mr. Pillai was involved in the consultation for the National Training Policy in 2009 and engaged in the policy design for implementation of a Comprehensive National Vocational and Educational Qualification Frameworks which is still to be passed into Law.

Pooran Chandra Pandey

Credited with pioneering the notion of involving civil society, business and government through consensus and convergence for inclusive and equitable policy for future generations, Mr. Pandey led launch of highly visible national public service campaigns such as Lead India, Teach India and the social impact awards winning appreciation from none other than the General Assembly of the United Nations. He also successfully carried out a number of innovative and game changing development ideas, including raising community infrastructure in public private partnership mode (valued at USD 100 million) in six disaster prone states in India, benefiting more than a million beneficiaries.

Over the years, Mr. Pandey has contributed to development of many public policies at national levels, chairing and co-chairing various task forces and committees of the Government of India leading to announcements of national policy on voluntary sector, implementation of UN Handbook, non-governmental charter of good governance, rationalization of policies for non-governmental organizations, and foreign contribution regulation act. He also advised UNV/UNDP on its first state of the world volunteering report, released globally on December 5, 2011.

Mr. Pandey holds an M.A in Philosophy from the University of Allahabad, Allahabad, an M.Phil in International Studies from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and a diploma in Public Diplomacy from Swedish Institute, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Government of Sweden, besides having obtained advanced leadership and global mid-career management programs from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, Asian Productivity organization, Tokyo, JAPAN; Fiji Productivity Board, Fiji and United Nations.

Some of the key leadership positions that Mr. Pandey has held over the years include Executive Assistant to Vice Chairman, Ispat Industries Limited, Chief Executive Officer of Voluntary Action Network India (VANI); Director, Times Foundation, Times of India Group and currently as Executive Director of United Nations Global Compact Network India (UNGCNI).

Mr. Pandey is also a British Chevening Scholar at the prestigious London School of Economics and Political Science, London and visiting fellows at the UTS, Sydney and University of Deakin, Melbourne in Australia besides sitting on the boards of leading academic institutions, non-profits and civil society organizations in India.

Mr. Pandey has travelled extensively and spoken on various subjects of public policy issues at national and global platforms.