26th & 27th April, 2019 Indian Institute of Management, Bengaluru
Replicable Solutions for Sustainable Energy and Income Generating Applications
Replicable Solutions for Sustainable Energy and Income Generating Applications
Poverty and climate risks are the two most important issues that are leading to increase in disparities across geographies. These disparities can be bridged by clean energy based productive solutions to achieve decent work and economic growth for all in a sustainable manner.
The two day event will bring together a diverse group of stakeholders: End Users; Livelihood Practitioners; Financing Institutions; Productive Use Technology Innovators; Energy Access Enterprises and many more, to discuss replicable models and processes that can scale sustainable energy and livelihood solutions and transform under-served communities.
SEE THE CONCEPT NOTE
If you are a student, researcher or innovator working in and from the grass roots and are interested in attending, write to us to avail travel and accommodation scholarships to attend the event.
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REGISTER NOWSDG7 is critical for achieving the goals laid under SDG8 - Sustainable energy enables the success of livelihood interventions at the grassroots level, leading to inclusivity and democratisation of wealth distribution. Looking at both the SGDs together can bring to light some of the much-needed livelihood related opportunities, that are primarily poor centric, and the related challenges with appropriate solutions.
Smita has spent more than 8 years working in the energy access ecosystem. In her current role at FOUNDATION FOR INNOVATION AND SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP (FISE), she is responsible for defining and implementing impact measures, portfolio optimization strategies, and work with R&D Labs within the ecosystem to drive cross disciplinary research and development.
Sudeshna oversees partnerships, field operations, capacity building, mini-grid utilisation, community engagement and impact assessment. Trained in participatory planning and with a commitment to inclusive growth, Sudeshna’s skills in community engagement cement Mlinda’s strong connections with mini-grid users.
Raghu Kullal is a potter hailing from Aloor, where pottery was the primary occupation for most households. By getting enrolled in a skill building program with a local organization (Namma Bhoomi), Mr Kullal was also able to diversify his product range to include terracotta jewelery, decorative pots, cookware etc., under his proprietory venture, Guruvandana Pottery Products.
Ramsingh Kabadi is a Tailoring entrepreneur from Badchatrang village, Odisha. The recipient of MUDRA (Micro Units Development and Refinance Agency) bank loan, Ramsingh is able to meet the seasonal demands and keep up with the orders, resulting in increase of INR 2500 in his monthly income. The Solar sewing machine has increased his productivity by 1.5 times per hour.
Agri Processing Entrepreneurs
Shivamma and Shivamurthy, a couple from the village Thulsikere, MM Hills, are the operators and caretakers of the Solar millet processing used in the processing of Ragi. The implementation has shown success in its initial days itself, where the number of Ragi and Jowar growers coming to get their product De-Stoned and Milled into flour is steadily increasing.
Mr. Tippeswamy, from Siddavanadurga a dairy farmer, installed the solar powered milking machines that changed the course of his business. Tippeswamy is overwhelmed by his success of using these machines. Less effort, time saving, usage of less manpower one person is able to manage all 8 cows has been pro points. As of now he supplies 100 litres of milk on daily basis. His daily income is 2700-2800 INR.
Founder & CEO, Sangam Ventures
Karthik Chandrasekar is the founder & CEO of Sangam Ventures, an early stage fund focused on fighting climate change and driving resource productivity. He is also the Chairman of AIC-Sangam Innovation Foundation, India’s first dedicated Cleantech Incubator set up in partnership with the Government of India’s Niti Aayog. Karthik actively works to improve the clean technology entrepreneurial eco-system for India. Prior to Sangam he led clean-tech investments in India for Acumen. Prior to Acumen, Karthik was with TVS Capital Funds where he focused on developing investment thesis for providing basic services in water, energy and agriculture for inclusive growth. As part of the fund MD’s initiative, he also assisted CII and Prof. C.K. Prahalad in developing vision for India@75. During his initial career in the US and UK, Karthik worked in the banking and financial services sector with Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch in their Investment Banking and Private Client groups. Karthik holds an MBA from Chicago Booth, MS in Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon and a B. Tech from IIT Bombay.
With an experience of around 15 years in the field of rural development, Mr Ganesh Neelam works towards creating disruptive technological solutions that cater to community development. Mr Neelam joined Sir Ratan Tata Trust in 2004 as a Programme Associate handling the flagship programme – Central India Initiative, focusing on enhancing livelihoods of tribal communities in central India. Post this, he led the Central India Initiative as the Executive Director of Collectives for Integrated Livelihood Initiatives (CInI), Jamshedpur, an associate organisation of the Trusts. During his seven-year tenure at CInI, thematic initiatives such as kharif maize stabilisation, non-timber forest produce and strengthening community institutions were developed in collaboration with the tribal communities in Jharkhand, Orissa, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan.
Council for Energy, Environment and Water
Sasmita Patnaik is a Programme Lead at the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW). Sasmita’s work at The Council has focussed on access to energy for income generation, healthcare and cooking. In her research, she is keen to understand the nuances of socio-economic contexts that define access to, and use of, energy. Sasmita has seven years of research experience in rural development, sustainability and social entrepreneurship. Sasmita holds an M.Sc. in Development Studies from School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) and a Post-Graduate Diploma in Rural Management from Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB).
CLEAN (Clean Energy Access Network)
Prerna is a young and energetic professional with seven years of experience in Renewable Energy Sector. Her expertise are regulatory and policy research, policy advocacy, development of market models. She is an engineer (electronics) and holds a Master’s in Business Administration (MBA) degree in Power Management.
Principal Secretary to Government, Rural Development & Panchayat Raj Department & Chairperson, Executive Committee, MGIRED
Shri Luthfulla Khan Atheeq selected to IAS in 1991. He did his M.A. in Public Administration at Syracuse University, USA and M.Sc. in Agricultural Economics at UAS, Bangalore. He worked in various capacities in Karnataka State. These include working as Deputy Secretary (Services), Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms, responsible for Cadre Management of All India and other Services. Served as Chief Executive Officer, Karwar and Deputy Commissioner of Mandya and Hassan Districts, responsible for District Administration. Served as Director, KRWSSA, RDPR and implemented World Bank assisted Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project. Served as State Project Director, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, responsible for universalisation of elementary education.
He served in Government of India on deputation from the State as Director and Joint Secretary in the Prime Minister’s Office. Was involved in the process of conceptulisation and formulation of policies and their approval for implementation. Also had the opportunity to work as Senior Adivser to the Executive Director, World Bank, Washington D.C. on foreign assignment basis from Govt. of India. Worked as Principal Secretary Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms (DPAR). Served as Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister of Karnataka during May-2016 to May-2018. Wherein he headed the Chief Minister’s office and advised the Chief Minister on Key Policy and Administrative issues.
Presently working as Principal Secretary, Rural Development and Panchayat Raj, Govt. of Karnataka – responsible for implementation of MGNREGA, Rural Drinking Water Supply, Swatchh Bharat Abhiyan, Rural Roads and Panchayat Raj Institutions.
Harsha Trust
Mr. Gautam Kumar Pradhan, a post graduate in Agricultural Science from Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology has been associated with the Harsha Trust since its inception. He is one of the founder members of the trust having grass-root experience of long 18 years in the field of agriculture and irrigation. He was the CEO cum Executive Director of Harsha Trust. He is also a national level resource person for value chain development in agriculture for National Rural Livelihoods Mission.
He is a visiting faculty to KIIT School of Rural Management, Bhubaneswar. Harsha Trust is a development organization working for the underprivileged, especially with the tribal of South Odisha for enhancing their livelihoods and improving the quality of life. At present, Harsha trust works with more than 90,000 households. Harsha trust is also a resource organization for NABARD in FPO promotion in Odisha.
Jagadish Naik is 25 years old from Pochikatte Thandya Village, Chikkanayakanahalli Taluk, and Tumkur district. His family comprises of 3 members, all 3 of them are involved in this livelihood. His family’s primary income is from Coir Making and secondary income is from agriculture. He has 2 acres of farm land. Jagadish started this work when he was 5 years in age and he trained from his parents at that time. At that time, he was doing it part-time but from the last 5 years, he is doing this livelihood full time along with agriculture. Jagadish family involved in this livelihood since the last 50+ years. They are using manual ratts until we intervene. Selco provided him a solar power electronic ratt as a demo. In a weeks time, he was very much interested to buy the system as he liked the solution also and he came to know the uses of the system.
Bigstamp, Millet machine and Tools
Narayan graduated from Visvesvaraya Technological University in India with a Bachelor Degree in Mechanical Engineering in 2003 . He has published over fifteen papers in the field of Fatigue and Fracture Mechanics, and also performed numerous research on Finite Element Analysis and Field testing. He has a passion for the field of engineering community level efficient, reliable Agriculture machinery. He believes that organic apt simple technology is the the key element in sustainable livelihoods. He is currently associated with three millet based social enterprises
Earth360 (www.earth360.in), that networks with over 1000 farmers and processes millets
Millet machines and tools LLP an grass root engineering enterprise which is into community level farm mechanisation
Kaulige Foods (www.kaulige.com) a millet enterprise which is working with the Urban community towards revival of millet via Sustainable food alternatives.
Maletesh S Puttannavar currently working as Assistant Director of Agriculture at District Agriculture Training Center, Babbur Farm, Hiriyur taluk, Chitradurga District. He has done his Masters in Agriculture from University of Agriculture Science, Dharwad. He has started his career in Banking sector and served as Assistant Manager (Rural Development) in Syndicate Bank for three years. Later he joined Department of Agriculture. He taken several initiative at soil sampling units like using Clean energy for the units. He has done a tremendous job at DATC farm by solar powering the entire Agri processing units and educating the farming community on sustainable energy and its implications in the sector.
Only woman entrepreneur in Bharat, who designs and manufacture farmer friendly agriculture/horticulture machinery. A Computer application programmer by profession who left the IT world to pursue her passion of becoming a women entrepreneur , during late 90’s, in machine manufacturing sector – a place unwelcoming to Women till today! She raised Rs.50,000 to start her venture of giving farmer friendly solution from broom making to agricultural automation.
She is a recipient of many national and state award for her contribution on agriculture automation innovation. She is also a board member of women entrepreneur group AWAKE ,LUB and she is a resource person/mentor for many Women universities in India and a alumni of ISB Hyderabad. Dr.C.B. Vijaya Vittala (head of Design) is a mentor for her and been a constant support in her venture so far.
With a vision to enable livelihoods and enhance quality of life through Education, Employability and Entrepreneurship, Gayathri Vasudevan co-founded Labournet in 2006. She is a doctorate in Development Studies, with over 23 years of work in the development Sector. A research scholar on gender and labour issues, she spent early years of her career exploring rural India at the grass roots level that led her to experience firsthand the life and day-to- day challenges faced by people in villages. She worked at International Labour Organisation, United Nations technical institution for eight years before she started Labournet services India pvt.ltd.
Gayathri has held several advisory posts in the government and other private boards and, presently, is member of Tailoring Advisory Board-Raymond, CII - National Skills Committee, National Sports Committee, Periyar Technology Business Incubator (Periyar TBI). She has more than 30 publications in the areas of labour, employment and gender issues to her credit. She has won numerous awards in the last decade as a social entrepreneur for her exemplary work in labour issues and is one of 53 most Powerful Women in Business in India.
Director IIMB
G. Raghuram has been Director, IIM Bangalore, since February 2017. Prior to taking over as Director of IIM Bangalore, he was Professor and Chairperson of the Public Systems Group at IIMA. He has been Dean (Faculty), IIMA, Vice-Chancellor of the Indian Maritime University and Indian Railways Chair Professor.
He specializes in infrastructure and transport systems, and logistics and supply chain management. He conducts research on the railway, port, shipping, aviation and road sectors. He has published over 35 refereed papers in journals and written over 160 case studies. He has published six co-authored books. He was awarded (i) ‘Life-time Achievement Award’ for Transport Excellence, by Mahindra and Mahindra, supported by Ministry of Road Transport and Highways in 2018 (ii) ‘MC Puri Memorial Award’ for contribution to Operational Research in India in 2016 (iii) ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’ for contribution to Logistics and Infrastructure by EXIM News in 2014 and (iv) ‘Academician of the Year’ by the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport in 2012. He is a Fellow of the Operational Research Society of India, and Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport. He has teaching experience at universities in India, USA, Canada, Yugoslavia, Singapore, Tanzania, UAE and Japan.
He is a member of the Board of Directors of three companies in the fields of infrastructure and logistics. Overall, he has been on the Board of 14 companies. He is on the Board of four educational institutions, one NGO and on the Advisory Board of a few other educational institutions. He has offered consultancy services to over 100 organizations including multilateral agencies. He has been part of various government policy making and advisory committees for the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Ministry of Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution, Ministry of Railways, Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, Ministry of Shipping, Cabinet Secretariat, Comptroller and Auditor General, the Planning Commission and various State Governments.
Raghuram has a BTech from IIT, Madras; a Post Graduate Diploma in Management from IIM, Ahmedabad; and a PhD from Northwestern University, USA.
Professor M S Sriram is currently Visiting Faculty at IIM Bangalore. He is also a Distinguished Fellow at the Institute for Development of Research in Banking Technology, Hyderabad – an institute set up by the Reserve Bank of India. He is a graduate from Institute of Rural Management Anand and completed his doctoral studies at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.
Sriram has served as an expert on several expert committees: Task Force on revival of Rural Cooperative Credit Institutions [Vaidyanathan Committee]; Expert Committee on Kerala Cooperative Bank (as Chair); External Advisory Committee of the RBI for licencing Small Finance Banks; The Financial Inclusion Advisory Committee of RBI. He is currently on the boards of Indian Dairy Machinery Company, NDDB Dairy Services, Centre for Budget and Policy Studies, National Institute of Bank Management, and a Trustee of RangaShankara (Bangalore) Dastkar Andhra and Pratham Books.
Mr Kusumadhara Kepalakaje worked as a Sr. Engineer at Hindusthan Powerplus Pvt Ltd, Hosur, and is the son-in-law of Raghava Gowda, the inventor of ‘Milk Master’, the hand operated milking machine. Raghava Gowda was a primary school teacher, and had agriculture land and a small dairy farm. The dairy farm was very profitable but milking was a physically challenging work and an automatic milking machine was very expensive. He found the need for low cost milking machine and started developing a prototype of the manual milking machine. He studied the principle of automatic milking machine, with the help of Mr Kusumadhara who assisted him technically to develop the manual milking machine. They were successful in launching the hand operated MILKMASTER on 2nd Feb 2002.
To develop their patented invention and deliver the product to small farmers in need, at affordable price they started Ksheera Enterprise in the Murulya Village, a company for manufacturing innovative low cost simple milking machine. At Ksheera the innovative ideas are engineered to perfection, to deliver world class milking machines. Engineering standards, tolerances and material compositions are never compromised to ensure excellent performance for years together. Ksheera Enterprises has received enormous support of National Innovation foundation for developing and marketing the innovation. Presently Ksheera Enterprises has a fabrication, assembly, and testing facility to produce two thousand milking machines per month. They have received popularity in media channels and amongst their satisfied customers. This rural innovation has given employment to about 30 people. All employees are from surrounding villages. It has helped to improve the quality of life of the villagers. They have supplied 750 milking machines to Kolar Milk Union in Karnataka state during the year 2017-18 and 210 electrical and 708 hand operated milking machines supplied through Suntech Agri Equipments Bangalore to Andhra Pradesh milk federation in 2018-2019.
Shuboday is alumni of IIT-Madras and presently working with ‘Ernst & Young LLP’ as ‘Associate Vice President’ in the ‘Power & Utilities’ group within the ‘Transaction Advisory Services’ unit. He has over nine years of experience advising governments, electric utilities, energy service companies, financial institutions and not-for-profit foundations in the areas of power sector reforms, clean energy transition technologies, policies, financing and investments. Shuboday is currently working with Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation for integrating energy efficiency with energy access interventions. The initiative led by Shakti has special focus on improving energy access in rural livelihoods by scaling up adoption of energy efficient technologies. Shuboday will discuss opportunities for leapfrogging energy efficiency in rural livelihood applications, challenges faced by entrepreneurs and industry for innovation, developing market ready products and achieving scale for sustainable business model.
Joysingh is a youth from the hills of Karbi Anglong who is the founder and proprietor of Hills Solar Power. He has installed five demos in the remotest villages of Karbi Anglong- 2 LSKs, 2 Sewing Machines and 1 Air Compressor. Through the demo systems, Joysing generated 23 enquiries from various parts of West Karbi Anglong. It is important to note that in Hamren, Karbi Anglong bank linkage is not possible so Joysing submitted a proposal seeking financial support from SELCO Foundation. And with the support from SELCO Foundation, he has replicated 23 enquiries- 8 LSKs, 4 Sewing Machines, 1 Blacksmith Blower, 10 Light for Livelihood. Joysing has also done 80 SHLS through direct cash.
Apart from these, he has also completed a project from IIT Madras through APDCL for installation and maintenance of 387 SHLS in West Karbi Anglong, Chingthong block. After completion of the 387 installations, he bagged another project from APDCL for installations and maintenance of 5000 SHLS out of which he has completed 1500 installations. Apart from SELCO Incubation Program Joysing has attended 6 days training on Solar Home Lighting System and Solar Lantern organized by NDIRP.
Shripathi Hadigal currently works as a Program Manager for Global Replication Program at SELCO Foundation. He helps the team with operation, conceptualization, and coordination of the program in the process of scaling and replicating the ecosystem development work that SELCO has successfully done in India over the two decades in other geographies. Prior to SELCO, Shripathi was involved in the development sector in various capacities from planning and implementation of Space Technology assisted sustainable health, education, and agriculture infrastructure solutions to co-found a start-up in providing a supportive ecosystem to sustainable farming in India. After an experience of working in different geographies and with communities on the ground, his interest lies at the intersection of global conversations being translated into solutions at the grassroots level. Shripathi holds an MSc in Space Technology from the International Space University, Strasbourg, France and a bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from NITK, Surathkal, India.
Ekta Jaju is the Founder and CEO at ONganic Foods. She is extremely passionate about Organic Farming, and its impact on small holder farmers in East India. Previously she had Co-Founded Switch ON and ONergy Solar. Ekta has strong experience in the areas of Sustainable Energy and Agriculture, and consulted to several national and international organisations including UN Women, GIZ. Ekta has been awarded Un Ltd India fellowship, CSA Fellowship from Packard foundation, DASRA and BYCL fellowships. Ekta has specialized in direction from Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, and Entrepreneurship Development from Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad.
Nilanjan has a multidisciplinary background and has been working in the development sector for last 14 years. He is working as a senior advisor for the Indo- German Energy Programme- Access to Energy for Rural Areas (IGEN-Access) of GIZ for last four years. His key areas of interest includes to explore finding suitable solutions affecting low income rural households through use of decentralized renewable energy for agriculture. He primarily works with social enterprises, clean energy start-ups on building sustainable business models. Nilanjan has been responsible for developing the GIZ’s portfolio on promotion of solar powered irrigation system in general and solar powered irrigation pump in particular. He has also been responsible for some of the publications of his team. Nilanjan has a post graduate degree from London School of Economics and Political Science, London and an executive education qualification on Project Management from Indian Institute for Management, Ahmedabad.
Keshav has over 15 years of experience in international development and the private sector- specifically in the energy and climate change areas. Prior to joining AIREC, Keshav served as Sector Leader and Senior Advisor of the Energy and Climate Sector in SNV Netherlands Development Organisation. Keshav has also served as Senior Advisor to the Government of Ethiopia and led the development of the five-year country planning framework for the green growth planning and implementation. He holds a master's in rural management from North Eastern Hill University, India. He also holds postgraduate diplomas in Advanced Accounting and Natural Resource management from the University of California, San Diego and Wageningen UR.
Kallanagouda Shivanagouda Patil known as K S Patil is the Champion Branch Manager of the Bailhongal Branch of SELCO Solar Light Pvt Ltd. He worked as a “Junior Assistant Engineer” in the “Hubli Electricity Supply Company (HESCOM) for 11 Years. He pursued his Bachelors in LLB from the Dharwad University while working as JAE. After pursuing his Bachelors, he continued his work as JAE in HESCOM as he was more attracted towards the Technical and Social attributions.
Rachita Misra works as a Senior Program Manager in SELCO Foundation. With a background in architecture and regional planning, she brings in over six years of experience in designing models and programs that aim to reduce uneven access to resources. SELCO Foundation was started in 2010 as an open source platform to create solutions linking sustainable energy to poverty eradication.
Huda Jaffer is a product/-service/-system’s designer with a keen interest in user centric design specifically for sustainability and developmental issues. She has been critical in building the necessary processes of SELCO Foundation that has led to it being known as a pioneer in the field of building the ecosystem for sustainable energy access for the poor.
Gauri Singh is presently working as the Principal Secretary, Govt of MP in the Health sector for the last 3 years. Her role calls for providing direction, policy support and strategic inputs to improve the quality of implementation of health sector initiatives, policies and programmes. As a career bureaucrat, she has played a leadership role in helping set up a new multilateral agency (IRENA) between 2011-2014, implemented country level policies and infrastructure programs for the Government of India, directed projects lending at the national and state level, and run large World Bank funded development projects. Her roles have included working as the Joint Secretary, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, Government of India, Managing Director, MP State Financial Corporation, and Director on the Board of Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI).
Prior to these pivotal roles, the first 15 years of her career (1989-2004) were spent implementing grass roots development programs. This included being the Project Coordinator of the main poverty alleviation project of Government of Madhya Pradesh covering 2400 villages and funded by the World Bank; Mission Director for the Rajiv Gandhi Watershed Management Mission, the largest watershed program in India; and Managing Director, MP Fisheries Development Corporation.
Sumita Ghose is the founder and managing director of Rangsutra, a social enterprise which seeks to bring about socio economic development and inclusive growth in rural India by engaging both: the community and the market. Rangsutra is owned by 1800 rural artisans- most of whom are women. Other owners are like minded organizations and people committed to ensuring sustainable livelihoods for rural artisans in India. Rangsutra provides design, marketing, technical and organizational support needed to make crafts and allied rural industries into viable enterprises, so that they provide regular home / village based employment to 3500 rural artisans. Prior to setting up Rangsutra, Sumita lived and worked in different parts of rural India for many years– mostly in Western Rajasthan with the URMUL Trust, working with rural communities for social change and economic development.
Sumita has a Masters Degree in Economics from Mumbai University. She was a Fulbright scholar in the United States, where she completed a Masters Degree in Conflict Resolution. Sumita has also been a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship for Leadership, is among the first batch of the Aspen India Fellows, and most recently selected as a Synergos Global Fellow, 2012.
Richenda Van Leeuwen is a global executive with over 25 years of international executive management experience. She founded and led the United Nations Foundation’s (UNF’s) work on energy access and its engagement with the United Nations’ Sustainable Energy for All (SEforAll) initiative. A globally recognized expert on energy access, she built the UNF’s Energy Access Practitioner Network—a network of enterprises delivering clean power solutions to developing countries. From its launch in 2011, the network expanded rapidly, growing to a global network of over 2,300 members driving market-led finance and policy solutions for energy access in developing countries. In particular, the network focused on helping to connect companies to capital and addressing the issues required to help the sector scale. Before joining the UNF in 2010, she worked at Good Energies, a global renewable energy private equity firm, where she led renewable energy investments in emerging markets. She was also a founding board member of the Good Energies Foundation, focusing on impact investing in renewable energy solutions for energy access and sustainable development.
Previously, she spent nearly five years as Chief Executive Officer of Trickle Up, an international microenterprise development non-government organization focused on equity and training for women micro-entrepreneurs across the developing world. Van Leeuwen joined the Global LPG Partnership as Chair of International Institutions in late 2016. She leads work on bringing clean cooking fuels and solutions—as part of the needed suite of energy access services—across Africa and in others parts of the developing world. She is also part of a three-person high-level Technical Advisory Group to the Energy Sector Management and Assistance Program (ESMAP) at the World Bank.
She is a sought-out global speaker on energy access, gender development, and poverty issues, and her career has spanned work on four continents. She serves on the board of SELCO India, a leading Indian solar energy social enterprise. She co-chaired a high-level technical committee for the World Bank Climate Investment Fund’s Scaling Up Renewable Energy program and is on the advisory boards of varied enterprises delivering clean energy services in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. She earned her Bachelor’s and MBA degrees from Durham University, United Kingdom.
Sarah Alexander is a Sr. Advisor with SELCO, an organization that seeks to alleviate poverty and create assets for the poor via last mile energy access solutions. Sarah leads the organization’s inclusive investment advocacy program and global replication of an ecosystems approach to energy access in Tanzania and Philippines. With close to 12 years of experience in the energy access sector, Sarah has worked on multiple programs at the confluence of energy access, sustainable development and poverty. She has previously presented at various national and international programs to propagate the concept of an energy access ecosystem. Sarah holds an MSc in Conservation Biology from State University of New York (SUNY), College of Environmental Sciences and Forestry.
Shridevi Melavanki, a 23-year-old woman, has a printing and photocopying shop which is solar powered.. She has fought bravely even with her circumstances of being affected by polio in the village of Neginhal. Her shop is most popularly known as ‘the little store with a solar panel above’ and ‘the Xerox shop which runs even when ‘current’ isn’t there in other photocopying centers’ have become synonymous to the story of revival here. Today she conducts a three-months course, and it’s made their oppurtunities and financial conditions even better.
Mr. Upendra Sahoo is a 55-year old solar entrepreneur who has had an experience of 15 years of working with an NGO and has been associated with SELCO Foundation since 2015-16. He is the founder of Tarini Enterprises, a social enterprise that aims to provide solutions to basic energy access issues in the Mayurbhanj District, Odisha. He has his registered office at Udala, Mayurbhanj district, Odisha. He used to initially work as a technician in a radio shop and had a stall 15 years back. He started off by renting out tents for housing purpose, and sound systems, mostly speakers and then eventually set up an electronic shop. The enterprise has been successful in functioning in the local area, is expanding to other nearby areas and a new branch has already been set up in Thakurmunda block.
Anish is Co-lead at Transforming Rural India Foundation (www.trif.in). Anish was part of the senior management team at PRADAN, India’s leading rural development NGO. His areas of expertise include creating business organizations run by poor communities and facilitating participation of small-holder farmers in modern value chains. He has been part of erstwhile Planning Commission’s Working Group on disadvantaged farmers, and has been involved in designing programmes on producer collectives. Anish was involved in developing small-holder poultry model, run by poor women this has emerged as the largest family poultry network in India with turnover of US $ 56 million, he is involved with National Smallholder Poultry Development Trust (www.nspdt.org), supporting more than 11,000 women.
Hari Natarajan has around 18 years of experience in the energy sector, especially the clean energy and energy access space in India. During this period, he has been involved in a wide range of activities spanning grass-root level interventions, incubation, business development support, enterprise & end-user financing, regulatory & policy level engagement and networking, including the establishment and management of an industry association for decentralized renewable energy enterprises.
Technology solutions that he has worked with include solar home systems, mini-grids, solar pumping, pico & micro hydro systems, biogas and biomass systems, improved cookstoves, etc. He has also been involved in utility scale policy and regulatory interventions post the Electricity Act 2003.
Devakishor Soraisam is the founder of Mangaal Sustainable Solutions. Mangaal, for the past 6 years, has been working towards making clean & reliable energy accessible & affordable to all, especially the rural underserved population in Manipur.
Garima Kumari, is a development professional with a decade of vast experience to work with the Tribal communities in central India Tribal belt mainly Jharkhand. She is working with CInI - TATA TRUSTS as a regional coordinator for Chotanagpur region (Hazaribagh Khunti cluster) in Jharkhand and holds the responsibility of mainly Rural Livelihood, Lac & Rural Enterprise theme in Jharkhand. She has initiated the value chain work in lac in Jharkhand where solar energy is one of the enabler. She has worked as one of the core team member of the designing and grounding the TATA TRUSTS Mission 2020 : Lakhpati Kisan Work.
Garima has done B.Tech Agriculture Engineering from Allahabad. She has also done master in Social Work to understand more on community work. She started her career with the leading development organization PRADAN and worked in extremist effected block of Jharkhand on implementing watershed project and other livelihoods projects.
