Mr. Manoj Kumar Nambiar

Chairperson
MD, Arohan Financial Services Ltd.

Mr. Manoj Nambiar has over 32 years of working experience and is currently with the Aavishkaar Group as the Managing Director of Arohan Financial Services Limited. He started his career with Modi Xerox in 1988 and moved into financial services with GE Countrywide in 1995. He did stints with ANZ Grindlays and ABN Amro Bank NV India and then moved to the Middle East joining National Bank of Oman as Head Retail Banking in 2002 looking after Oman, UAE, and Egypt. He became the COO of the Alhamrani - Nissan Finance company, KSA and thereafter the Deputy CEO of Ahli Bank SAOG in Muscat, Oman. He returned to India in June 2010 as MD & CEO of IntelleCash Microfinance Network Company (P) Limited (an Intellecap Group company) in the business of incubating and capacity building of MFIs getting deputed as the MD of Arohan in 2012.

Mr. Nambiar is a mechanical engineer by graduation from VJTI in 1986, an MBA in Marketing by post-graduation from JBIMS in 1988, both from Mumbai University and has tertiary qualifications in insurance from III. He has also completed a “Strategic Leadership in Microfinance” course from the Harvard Business School, Boston, the US in April 2013 and “Strategy meets leadership” course from INSEAD, France in Aug’19. He joined the MFIN board first in 2013, was the President in 2015 and got re-elected in 2018. Mr Nambiar likes to listen to soft music in his free time.

Mr. Devesh Sachdev

Chairperson
MD & CEO, Fusion Micro Finance Ltd.

An XLRI postgraduate with an experience of over 19 years in varied sectors of Banking, Logistics and Microfinance, Devesh co-founded Fusion in 2010. Under his leadership, Fusion has grown to a client base of 1.85 MN clients with a portfolio size of 3,600 Cr in 18 states of India. Devesh’s long term vision and executing strategy is validated by the marquee PE firm Warbug Pincus’s decision to choose Fusion to make its first investment in the Indian Microfinance arena in 2018. His unwavering conviction on upholding organizational value system has enabled Fusion to strive despite of volatile and turbulent environment which sector has faced intermittently over the last one decade. Devesh has served various Boards since 2008 and was elected as Vice President of MFIN in 2017. He has represented the sector in diverse forums and platforms to create a healthy and positive outlook. He got awarded as the ‘50 Fastest Growing CEOs of India’ by ‘The CEO Magazine’ in 2018. He is a strong advocate of agile transformation and digital innovation for employee centric seamless operations which made Fusion the “Best Workplaces in MFI” in its debut year of GPTW certification with 66th position in top 100 workplaces in India.

Mr. Manoj Kumar Nambiar

MD – Arohan Financial Services Ltd.

Manoj Kumar Nambiar has over 35 years of working experience and is currently with the Aavishkaar Group as the Managing Director of Arohan Financial Services Limited – one of the largest NBFC MFIs active in the 15 low-income states of central, east, west & northeast parts of India.

He started his working career with Modi Xerox in 1988 and then moved into consumer financial services with GE Countrywide, retail banking with ANZ Grindlays, and retail assets & business development with ABN Amro Bank NV India in 2000. He was Head Retail Banking of the National Bank of Oman in 2002 looking after Oman, UAE & Egypt, and then Chief Operating Officer of the Alhamrani - Nissan Finance company, KSA in 2004 and returned to Oman as the Dy CEO of Ahli Bank SAOG in 2008. He returned to India in Jun’10 as MD & CEO of Intellecash and post-acquisition of Arohan has been the MD since 2012.

He is a mechanical engineer by graduation from VJTI in 1986, an MBA in Marketing by post-graduation from JBIMS in 1988, both from Mumbai University and has tertiary qualifications in insurance from III. He completed the “Strategic Leadership in Microfinance” course from the Harvard Business School, Boston, US in Apr’13, the “Strategy meets Leadership” course from INSEAD, France in Aug’19 & “Leadership for Impact “at IMD Lausanne, Switzerland in Dec’22.

He is a director on the boards of Arohan, Aavishkaar & Intellecap, the Vice Chair of the Group Executive Council at Aavishkaar Group & also on the Board of Trustees at AMFI WB.

Mr. Vineet Chattree

MD - Svatantra Microfin Pvt. Ltd.

Vineet Chattree is the Managing Director at Svatantra Microfin Pvt. Ltd. and Director on Svatantra Micro Housing Finance Corporation Ltd. He has a rich experience of 25+ years across Operations and Management Consulting in India, USA, and Middle East. His passion for serving the financial excluded segment and strategic thinking has enabled both Svatantra Microfin and Svatantra Micro Housing map out an accelerated, differentiated, and sustainable growth path to emerge as amongst the most impactful and respected entities in their own arena.

Vineet has helped realise the vision of Svatantra to offer host of financial services to EWS and LIG customers in the informal segment by creating impact in more than 3.3 Mn household over the last 10 years, with Svatantra Microfin and Svatantra Micro housing achieve USD 1.1 bn assets under management.

A continuous learner, Vineet is a Chemical Engineering graduate and has two master’s degrees in business administration and business laws. He has attended the executive program in The Wharton School. He loves reading and is an avid trekker and Marathoner.

Vipin Kumar Varma

Manager

Vipin has over 9 years of diversified industry experience in data analysis, monitoring, and evaluation. Prior to joining MFIN, he worked with SAATHI as a Senior M&E, at REACH as a Program Associate M&E, MAMTA-HIMC as a Program Manager (MIS), and as a Data Manager at The Union. He specializes in data analysis by using tools such as MySQL, Python, and Tableau, and is well-versed in designing data collection tools such as Google Forms, KOBO Toolbox, Epi Collect, and Survey-CTO. He also has good knowledge of advanced Excel, VBA, Power BI, and Looker studio applications.

Vipin graduated from Uttarakhand Technical University with a Bachelor of Technology in Electronics and Communication Engineering, as well as a certificate in Computer Science and Engineering. In addition to his technical skills, he is enthusiastic about learning and problem solving.

Mr. Dibyajyoti Pattanaik

Director, Annapurna Finance Pvt. Ltd.

Mr. Dibyajyoti Pattanaik has over 17 years of experience in microfinance, micro-enterprise development and development sector consulting. Previously, he had contributed as a business consultant for APITCO in Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises space. He has worked with Public and Development Sector Institutions in various roles prior joining Peoples’ Forum as Program Head & CFO in 2007. Currently, he is the Director of Annapurna Finance Pvt. Ltd.

He is also serving as the President of OSAFII (Odisha Association of Financial Inclusion) which is actively working towards Financial Inclusion in the state of Odisha for development of the underprivileged to serve them through responsible finance. He has served as the Vice President of MFIN, where he contributed to the overall issues pertaining to the financial inclusion sector. Dibyajyoti holds a Post Graduate Diploma in development studies from EDII (Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India), Ahmedabad, and has successfully completed a management programme in micro-finance from Boulder Institute of Microfinance, Turin, Italy. In addition, he has also attended Strategic leadership in the field of Inclusive Finance from Harvard Business School, Boston, Massachusetts.

Mr. George K John

Executive Director, ESAF Small Finance Bank.

Mr George K John has nearly three decades of experience in Banking, Finance and Development sector, ranging from grassroot experience to senior management level across multiple geographies. A microfinance practitioner since 1995, he addressed the unserved and underserved segment of the society, with his deep-rooted passion for serving the society through micro lending, job creation, skill development and livelihood promotion.

Committed to fight financial discrimination in the geographies ESAF served, Mr George K John was the strength behind the increase in microfinance customers from the first set of 5 in 1995 to 5.5 million by 2022. He was also successful in bridging other gaps in child development, education, slum development, water and sanitation, renewable energy etc creating a direct impact in society.

As EVP – Business, Mr George K John played a key role in the transformation of ESAF Microfinance, spearheading the development of new processes, procedures, and digital systems, which fuelled the growth of ESAF Bank in 5 years of its operationalisation. He was a key strategic contributor in efforts which drove the major expansion of ESAF’s Microfinance and Developmental Programmes covering the South, Central and Eastern India.

Currently as EVP at ESAF, Mr George K John is responsible for managing the Operations, Finance, Strategy & Planning, Treasury, Digital Banking, Sustainable Banking, etc. He is an alumnus of the CMC College Kottayam, Karve Institute, Pune and BITS Pilani.

Mr. Devesh Sachdev

Founder, MD & CEO
Fusion Finance Ltd.

Devesh Sachdev, An XLRI Post Graduate with 25 years of experience in the Service Industry prior to starting Fusion in 2009-10. Under his leadership, Fusion has grown into one of the leading microfinance institutions and continues to expand its operations. He attended and successfully completed Strategic leadership program in Harvard Business School. He has previously served on governing board of MFIN both as Chairperson and member

Mr. Krishnan Venkatesh

Executive Vice President
HDFC Bank Ltd

A Chartered Accountant with over 3 decades of work experience in reputed institutions in the financial services space and cutting across diverse functions. Was the MD/CEO of Dvara KGFS (erstwhile IFMR) before moving to HDFC Bank to take charge of the financial inclusion business in 2018. Handle both the retail as well as wholesale portfolio in the Bank. As part of a universal Bank, also pay a key role in growing the Self-Help Group business for which the Bank was awarded the ‘Best Private Bank’ twice by MoRD (Ministry of Rural Development) in FY22 and FY23 respectively. Prior to moving to the inclusive space, was with HSBC for over a decade and exited as the Head of Branch Banking in 2010. Thereafter, spent nearly five years with L&T Insurance and was the Chief Distribution Officer when decided to do something more meaningful and hence the move to Dvara. Brought about some major structural changes within HDFC Bank to run this business which is quite different from any other asset vertical.

Amongst the various initiatives, critical ones include setting up of stand-alone low-cost branches across the country, getting the approval to become the first private bank in the country to hire under graduates and help them in their career progression, migrate from a plethora of different tech platform to a unified and end to end seamless platform to name a few. Extensive travel to different parts of Bharat and meeting customers, my own colleagues at the branches and people from the industry helps me have a holistic view of great practises, customer expectations/perception about institutions in this space and also gives me an opportunity to hear out suggestions from people on the ground on the need for tweaks and changes.

Mr. Dibyajyoti Pattanaik

Director
Annapurna Finance Pvt. Ltd.

Mr. Dibyajyoti Pattanaik has over 21 years of experience in microfinance, micro-enterprise development, and development sector consulting. Previously, he has worked with public and development sector institutions in various roles before joining Peoples’ Forum as Program Head & CFO in 2007. Presently, he is the Director of Annapurna Finance Pvt. Ltd. and serves as the President of OSAFII (Odisha Association of Financial Inclusion), which actively works towards financial inclusion in the state of Odisha to aid the development of the poor and serve them through responsible finance.

He has also served as a board member for two terms and vice-president for a term of MFIN (Microfinance Institutions Network), contributing to the overall issues pertaining to the financial inclusion sector. In 2021, he was listed among the Top 100 People’s Managers by Great Manager Institute and Forbes India. He holds a Post Graduate Diploma from EDII (Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India), Ahmedabad, and has successfully completed a management programme in microfinance from Boulder Institute of Microfinance, Turin, Italy. Additionally, he has attended strategic leadership programs in the field of inclusive finance from institutes such as Harvard Business School and the London School of Economics.

Mridul Basiya

Finance Officer

Mridul is a qualified chartered accountant. He joined MFIN in June 2024. Before joining MFIN, he was associated with various chartered accountant firms and gained experience in the field of accounting, auditing, direct and indirect taxation. He is graduate in Commerce (B.Com).

Rishabh

Finance Officer

Rishabh has more than 9 years of experience in direct and indirect taxation, accounting, and finance management. He joined MFIN in March 2024. Before joining MFIN, he was associated with development and corporate sectors. He is graduate and post-graduate in Commerce (B.Com and M.COM).

Nishant Mahajan

Project Manager

Nishant comes with 14 years of Experience in Operations Management including more than 8 years of experience in managing Central & State Government run schemes through Bajaj Allianz GIC & Reliance GIC across states like Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and J&K. His stint with Bajaj and Reliance provided him with an opportunity to enhance his coordination skills for managing external stakeholders like financial institutions and farmer enrolment intermediaries. Apart from this his role involved drafting case studies, feedback & compliance reports, maintaining MIS, handling customer grievances and providing inputs to legal team for litigation cases. In academics, he holds a master degree in Business Administration – Finance (MBA) from ICFAI Business School, Noida, U.P. and bachelor degree in Commerce from Panjab University, Chandigarh.

Mr. Abhisheka Kumar

Co- Founder & MD, Sindhuja Microcredit Pvt. Ltd.

Mr Abhisheka Kumar is the Co-Founder & Managing Director of Sindhuja Microcredit Pvt Ltd. He has been associated with the microfinance industry since 2004 and has an experience of varied roles and responsibilities - Donor, Technical Assistance Provider, Mentor, Lender and Microfinance Practitioner. He has a holistic understanding of the sector, the challenges faced in the past and perspective on the road ahead.

Mr Kumar has an experience of being the founding team member of a new generation microfinance institution and small finance bank which steered up the start-up to a major MFI & then to an SFB. Abhisheka has rich experience in Fund raising, Preparing Business Model, Investor Relations, Risk Management, Audit & Compliance etc. Earlier, he has worked with FWWB, ICICI Bank and Utkarsh Small Finance Bank.

He is a Graduate from St. Xavier’s College Kolkata and has pursued Post Graduation in Rural Management from Institute of Rural Management Anand.

Mr. Ankush Golechha

Promoter & Director, Aviral Finance Pvt Ltd.

Mr. Ankush Golechha is the Promoter and Director of Aviral Finance Pvt Ltd, which is the first and only NBFC-MFI headquartered in Chhattisgarh and established in 2017. He has pursued Bachelors in Commerce from Sydenham College, Mumbai and is a qualified Chartered Account. He also has a Diploma degree in Information System Audit from ICAI.

He is a Senior Partner in APAS & Co LLP, a 50-year-old Chartered Accountancy firm and has over 20 years of experience in the field of Auditing, Banking, Finance and Business Consulting. He was also an elected member of Central India Regional Council (CIRC) of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.

Ankush was instrumental in Aviral's foray into Microfinance and has been a strategic and guiding force behind it.

With his extensive experience and expertise in field of Information Technology, Aviral has adapted a fully digital microfinance operations and has been making cashless disbursement since inception.

Mr Golechha has been associated with various trade and social organisation and has been an office bearer in most of them namely JITO Raipur Chapter, JBN Raipur, Income Tax Bar Association, Shree Bal Ashram etc.

Mr. Vivek Tiwari

Vice-Chairperson
MD & CEO, Satya MicroCapital Ltd.

Mr. Vivek Tiwari has an experience of nearly two decades in Microfinance and Development Sector. His expertise lies in the innovative deployment of technological framework for incubating responsible lending, financial inclusion, social entrepreneurship, and impact investing within national boundaries. It was his far-sightedness and visionary thinking that made SATYA one of the fastest growing MFIs in the country with a strong network of over 1800 employees working across 22 states. Mr Tiwari spearheads the company’s strategic efforts, driving expansion with morality and a vision to develop entrepreneurship for the people at the Bottom of Pyramid.

He holds a Post Graduate Degree in Rural Development & Management from the Institute of Engineering & Rural Technology, Allahabad. He is also a certified professional of the Management Programme from Boulder Microfinance Training, Italy. He was felicitated with the BFSI Leadership Award as well as ‘Bharat Jyoti Award’ by India International Friendship Society for his contribution to the financial inclusion movement and for playing a pivotal role in accelerating the JLG/WSHG movement.

Jatin Kalra

Finance Manager

With an experience of over 6+ years, Jatin has worked in recognized CA firms where he managed audits and taxation of Corporates, PSUs, Banks & Non-profit organizations like National Aluminium Company, Rategain, Central Bank, Indian Bank, Indian Council of Medical Research, Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, FNF, National Council for Cement and Building Materials etc. He has also been responsible of hand-holding various start-ups namely Botlab Dynamics, Aerogram etc. by assisting them in Fund Raising, Budgeting & Forecasting financials. His core expertise includes Income Taxation, Start-ups Advisory & Auditing.

Jatin is a qualified Chartered Accountant and is pursuing his LLB. He has pursued his bachelor’s in commerce from Dyal Singh College, Delhi University. He is passionate about Instagram Food Blogging.

Mr. Prashant Thakker

Vice-Chairperson
ED & CEO Centrum Microcredit Ltd.

Mr. Prashant Thakker has been proved instrumental in the growth of Centrum Microcredit Ltd since its inception. He is also the founder and managing partner of ProGro Ventures and Advisor, an impact investing and advisory platform. With nearly 17 years of experience within the MFI industry, Prashant was with Standard Chartered Bank in a variety of roles including being the Global Head for Microfinance for almost a decade(2005-2015).He had launched Standard Chartered’s Microfinance program & has overseen equity, debt & mezzanine investments in over 100 Financial services intermediaries for over $2 Bn in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East across 22 countries.

Prashant has worked with global development financial institutions including the ADB, IFC and the World Bank Group and has implemented award winning programs which helped to increase access to finance the world’s unbanked and under-banked populations. He had completed several executive programs from Wharton and INSEAD, holds a PGDBM (Finance) and has graduated as a Bachelor of Commerce with a major in Entrepreneurship Management.

Mr. Udaya Kumar Hebbar

MD - CreditAccess Grameen Ltd.

Mr. Udaya Kumar Hebbar is the Managing Director at CA Grameen and a veteran in the microfinance industry who established that inclusive finance could succeed with a market-based model. He has been the architect behind the transformational journey of building the CA Grameen brand as the leading microfinance institution in India.

He is a seasoned banker with over 35 years of rich experience spanning across operations, including rural, agriculture, and micro-banking fields. Prior to joining CA Grameen, he held various leadership positions including Head of Commercial Banking and Payment Operations at Barclays Bank PLC. and successful stints of over a decade each in Corporation Bank and ICICI Bank. Mr. Udaya holds a Master’s degree in Commerce from Karnatak University, Dharwad, and is a certificated associate from the Indian Institute of Bankers.

Mr. Amardeep Singh Samra

MD and CEO, Midland Microfin Ltd

Mr. Amardeep Singh Samra is the MD and CEO of Midland Microfin Ltd. which is the first Punjab based microfinance institution and is one of the leading NBFC-MFIs in the states of Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Chandigarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttarakhand serving 0.45 Mn clients. Under his leadership in a short span of ten years, Midland Microfin has achieved exemplary landmarks including excellent asset quality.

He has a specialization in Finance, Marketing and Administration, introduced various innovative ideas within the business. He pioneered the concept of centralized credit sanctioning coupled with digital and cashless disbursement and was instrumental in creating an institution with focus on Corporate Governance andethical client relationship management.He successfully established an employee focused organization which is certified as ‘Great Place To Work’ for the second consecutive year.

Passionate about Photography and Art,he is a member of the Photographic Society of America (PSA) and a life member of Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) and participates across regional & international exhibitions. An avid runner and cyclist; he regularly participates across marathons across India. Furthermore, he is a member of Young Presidents Organisation (YPO) Punjab Chapter, the world’s premium network of chief executives.

Mr. Harish Venkata Raghu

Co-Founder, MD & CEO,
SaGgraha Management Services Pvt. Ltd.

Mr. Harish Raghu has a rich and varied experience of over 24 years across Agri, Rural, Banking and Financial sector. He has previously worked as a COO of Future Financial Services Ltd. (erstwhile Fincare) and CPO at Spandana Spoorthy. He has also been associated with Fullerton Gramshakti, ICICI bank, Madras Fertilizers in the past. His core expertise includes Sales, Operations, HR, Branch banking, Communications & PR, and Marketing. Mr. Raghu pursued B.Sc. in Agriculture, PGDBM and EGMP from IIM, Bengaluru. He is well connected to various rural management institutes where he is invited for guest lectures and conducts industry workshops on HR and Operations. Harish is an avid traveller.

Mr. Desh Raj Dogra

Ex-MD & CEO
CARE Ratings

Mr. Desh Raj Dogra has 39 years of rich experience within the financial sector in the areas of banking and credit rating. He has maintained a high growth trajectory after taking over as acting Managing Director and made CARE the second largest rating agency. Mr. Dogra also worked closely with the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, where CARE prepared a dossier on the Indian Economy as well as white papers on both the equity and debt markets for the Ministry. Mr. Dogra holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Agriculture from Himachal Pradesh University and MBA from Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi. He is a certified associate of the Indian Institute of Bankers.

Dr. Aruna Limaye Sharma

Indian Administrative Service Officer (Retd.)

Dr. Aruna Sharma, a Madhya Pradesh Cadre 1982, retired in 2018 as the Secretary, Steel in the Government of India. Prior to that, she was the Secretary, Information Technology in the Government of India. She is practitioner development economist with MSc from University of Bath UK and doctorate from University of Delhi. She has worked in development and core sectors. Her publications are - Reaching the Last Beneficiary: Resource Convergence Mantra Model –2008 (UNDP), Impact of Recourse Convergence in Policy Making, Program Design and Execution – 2014 (UNDP) and and latest is You@Game Changer for inclusive growth. She addressed John F Kennedy School, Harvard University on the issue of Financial Inclusion. She was member of a five-member high level committee of RBI on Deepening Digital Payment.

Mr. Vineet Chattree

Director, Svatantra Microfin Pvt. Ltd.

Mr. Vineet Chattree has over 25 years of experience spanning across Operations, financial services, Consulting and Merger & Acquisition domains in India, Middle East and US. Vineet currently heads both Svatantra Microfin Pvt Ltd and Svatantra Microhousing Finance Corporation Limited, which make differentiated offerings to the economically weaker and low-income group segments in Rural and Tier III segments across the country. Both these businesses cater to niche segments through unique customer-centric business models with a central purpose of making a meaningful difference in the lives of the customers – be it through financial awareness, financial inclusion, empowerment or access to basic infrastructure. Vineet is a chemical engineering graduate from Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai and has completed his Master of Management from IIT – B and Executive Management Program at Wharton. An avid reader, trekker, marathon runner and a firm believer in the preaching of Bhagavad Gita.

Swetan Sagar

Head - Advocacy and Development

Swetan Sagar has an MBA degree from Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM), Bhopal. He was earlier working with M-CRIL at the position of Chief Operating Officer and has over 18 years of experience in designing and leading multi-country programme evaluations in the financial inclusion space. His key areas of expertise include data analytics, market research, impact assessments, institutional assessments, capacity building of financial institutions and livelihood promotion institutions catering to the low-income segment. Swetan has led many projects in the financial inclusion and enterprise development sectors across India and 15+ countries in the Asia and Africa region.

Amit Mathur

SVP-Advocacy and Development

Amit is a professional with almost a decade of work experience. He has been working with MFIN since March,2015. Previously he has worked with BASIX India in livelihood development and ICICI Lombard GIC Ltd. as a Product Manager for group health insurance (Micro Insurance product). His most recent association was with the World Bank Group in the sphere of Digital Financial services. Amit has completed his Post- Graduate Diploma in Rural Management from IRMA, Anand.

Piyush Singh

AVP – Fintech and Projects

Piyush leads all the FinTech initiatives and related Projects at Microfinance Institutions Network (MFIN) under advocacy and development vertical. He has 11+ Years of work experience as Consultant, Strategic Alliance head and as Product and Project Lead in Digital Financial Services, FinTech and Financial Inclusion domain. Piyush has hands on experience of working with Remittance business, E-Governance, ICT4D, Business Correspondence, Mobile Money and Pre-paid instruments, India Stack, Aadhaar and other traditional and emerging Payment systems. He has done his masters from Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB) and executive course from Columbia business school. He is a certified Digital Banking and Design Thinking Practitioner, along with certifications on Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning for business.

Nishant Mahajan

Project Manager

Nishant comes with 14 years of Experience in Operations Management including more than 8 years of experience in managing Central & State Government run schemes through Bajaj Allianz GIC & Reliance GIC across states like Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and J&K. His stint with Bajaj and Reliance provided him with an opportunity to enhance his coordination skills for managing external stakeholders like financial institutions and farmer enrolment intermediaries. Apart from this his role involved drafting case studies, feedback & compliance reports, maintaining MIS, handling customer grievances and providing inputs to legal team for litigation cases. In academics, he holds a master degree in Business Administration – Finance (MBA) from ICFAI Business School, Noida, U.P. and bachelor degree in Commerce from Panjab University, Chandigarh.

Raj Kumar Chauhan

AVP

Raj is a seasoned professional with a postgraduate degree in Social Work and a specialization in Data Management, bringing over 17 years of expertise to the development sector. His career is distinguished by a profound focus on Strategic Information (SI) and data management, harnessing advanced tools such as R, SQL, Tableau, Power BI, and VBA. Raj excels in data mining, data cleaning, and the creation of robust data solutions.

Throughout his illustrious career, Raj has been instrumental in driving data-driven decision-making processes within esteemed organizations including the India HIV/AIDS Alliance, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Global Fund Projects, and State AIDS Control Society. His contributions have not only supported organizational goals but have also led to the development of nationally recognized tools, reflecting his commitment to innovation and sustainable solutions in the field.

Raj's expertise is further underscored by his ability to translate complex data into actionable insights, enabling organizations to achieve strategic objectives effectively. His proficiency in creating data-driven frameworks and his deep understanding of sector-specific challenges position him as a visionary leader in the development sector.

Kabir Krishna

VP-Knowledge Management

Kabir was earlier working with Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), where he served as Deputy Director at the CII-Rahul Bajaj Centre of Excellence on Skills. In this role, he led stakeholder communication and engagement, spearheaded annual publications such as India Skills Report, India Decoding Jobs, and India’s participation in the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report. Additionally, he headed their Policy Advocacy and Government Relations.

With over 13 years of experience, Kabir has worked across diverse verticals, including the Overseas Indian Facilitation Centre and the India@75 Foundation. He was also instrumental in shaping global policy discussions as part of the B20 India Secretariat for the Task Force on the Future of Work, Skilling and Mobility and currently serves as a member of the B20 Brazil Task Force on Education & Employment. Kabir holds an M.Phil. and M.Sc. in Social Anthropology from the University of Delhi.

Satheesh Arjilli

Project Manager

Satheesh comes with an experience of 24 years in financial inclusion domain, out of which 14 years has been in credit operations and 10 years in microinsurance including 5+ years in microinsurance consulting. His experience spans across financial inclusion, microcredit, microinsurance, climate change, fintech and agri-tech industries.

He started his career with BASIX and served around 17 years in various group companies of BASIX in India and abroad covering more than 15 countries. Other than the microfinance he got the opportunity of heading the microinsurance operations, and successfully established the retail microinsurance portfolio and streamlined several operational processes to make the microfinance and microinsurance integration seamless by use of technology. By virtue of this got an opportunity to Head the microinsurance consulting division wherein got exposed to various challenging assignments in diversified geographies across Asia and Africa. He has worked on several consulting assignments awarded by International Finance Corporation (IFC), ADB, Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC), United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) and ILO.

Satheesh holds Masters degree in management and completed his fellowship from Insurance Institute of India (III) and also has a graduation in Law and Legislation. He also hold a PG Diploma in Industrial Relations and Personnel Management from Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan, Mumbai.

Denish Parshad

Finance Officer – Projects

Denish Parshad has pursued his MBA in Finance from Saptarishi University ( Lucknow) and Bachelors in Commerce from Delhi University. He has over fourteen years of experience in accounting and financial systems, grant /sub Awards Management, budget management and monitoring, financial MIS, compliance and audits, procurement and administration. He has worked for various international NGOs where he supervised and supported sub-grantees strengthening their capacities under programs funded by The Global Fund, USAID, Taiwan Government etc.

Sugandh Saxena

Head, Self-Regulation & Compliance Officer

Sugandh heads the SRO vertical at MFIN. She joined MFIN during its start-up phase and played the lead role in MFIN's policy & advocacy work, development of credit bureau ecosystem, MFIN's data publications and research, and setting standards and benchmarks. Prior joining MFIN in 2011, she had worked with Bharat Electronics, SEWA Bharat, ITC and ACTED across a broad spectrum of areas related to technology, business and development themes.

Sugandh is an Electronics engineering graduate from MNNIT, Allahabad and a post-graduate in Social Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). She received the prestigious Commonwealth Scholarship for her post-graduate program at LSE. She was a fellow at Fletcher School Leadership Program for Financial Inclusion at Tufts University. She has attended several trainings in financial inclusion, risk management, credit bureaus, customer protection and financial literacy, including 'Strategic leadership for Microfinance' at Harvard Business School, 'Risk Management Excellence in MFIs' at ADA Luxembourg.

Dr. Vinay Kumar Singh

Head, Self-Regulation & Compliance

Dr. Vinay Kumar Singh is a doctorate in Economics and a seasoned management professional. Vinay has nearly two decades of experience in financial services with a successful track record in multinational organizations viz. Citibank NA & Aviva Life Insurance. He has multi-business experience in consumer lending, retail banking and insurance. Vinay has worked across geographies with cross-functional stints in sales, distribution, strategy, credit & risk, learning & development, and wealth management with experience in start-up/ turnaround situations.

At Aviva Life Insurance, Vinay implemented productivity enhancement of the sales teams by leveraging technology to digitalize the sales process and institutionalize blended learning. As the National Sales Strategy Head for the branch banking business at Citibank NA, Vinay successfully delivered the turnaround of laggard branches and early breakeven of new branches.

Vinay trained to be a Chemical Engineer at IIT Kanpur and then did a dual major in Economics & Finance at IIM Calcutta. He completed his doctorate in Economics from Management Development Institute Gurgaon where his thesis was on “The Dynamics of financial inclusion and economic growth amid demonetization”. He has published his research in top ranking peer reviewed academic journals. Vinay’s research interests are in impact assessment of financial inclusion policies, adoption of financial products and time-series econometrics. He is a regular contributor of opinion pieces in the leading financial daily Mint on topics related to financial inclusion.

Sheetal Jain

Acting Head – SRO

Sheetal joined MFIN in 2016 and has been part of different SRO functions including CGRM, Third-party Evaluations, enforcement and SRO governance. She currently leads the SRO work in terms of framing standards, research, enforcement and governance. Before joining MFIN, she was managing commercialisation of ICAR Technologies and Capacity building of various stakeholders with Agrinnovate India Limited. She has three years of rich experience with ICICI Bank Ltd. both in SME (asset side working capital funding of credit and non- credit facilities) and Retail Branch banking. Before Joining ICICI Bank, she was associated with BASIX within Bhartiya Samruddhi Finance Limited (BSFL), a NBFC dealing with microfinance and livelihood sustainability in Credit and Risk management team, where she also managed microfinance operations at the field level. Sheetal has completed her MBA in Rural Management from IRMA and is a B.Sc (Ag) Graduate from OUAT, BBSR.

Sankalp Tripathi

AVP SRO

Sankalp has been working with MFIN since Aug, 2016 as a Manager, Grievance Redressal, within the SRO team. Prior to MFIN, he has worked with GIZ on rural insurance and agriculture value chain development projects. He has worked briefly with Yes Bank and Ananya Finance on internship assignments related to financial literacy, process mapping and loan product development. Sankalp has completed his Post-Graduate Diploma in Rural Management from IRMA, Anand and Masters from TISS, Mumbai.

Jay Tripathi

AVP SRO

Jay has been with MFIN’s SRO function since 2017 and leads SRO’s data analysis, capacity building, monitoring functions, and reporting to the RBI and DFS, etc. He has experience in interfacing with different government departments, carrying various CSR and non-CSR projects from ideation to fruition, and of working with the media, which he gained from more than a decade long experience in diverse things including program management, consultancy, corporate social responsibility, NGO’s and media.

Previously he was employed with Mancer consulting services, Katha, Swayam Siddha, and Daily News and Analysis.

Jay holds a master’s degree in International Development- Management and Public Policy from the University of Manchester. He has also studied Media at the Asian College of Journalism, and Business Administration at Symbiosis.

Munish Bawa

Manager - Advocacy and Development

Munish Kumar Bawa has 11 years of experience analysing data using Power BI, SQL, VBA, and Excel. He understands the whole process, from planning to implementation. Munish collaborated with HIV/AIDS Alliance India, PHFI, FHI 360, SAATHII, and other national and international organisations. International AIDS Conference published his two PLHIV care and assistance study papers. He helps organisations implement MIS and LMS. Munish holds a master's in economics and in social work. He is pursuing a Ph.D. in Economics at RIMT University in Punjab.

Kshama Mishra

AVP – Advocacy & Development

Kshama has been working in the field of research and analytics. Kshama has joined MFIN from Econ One Research India, an economic consultancy, where she was a Senior Economic Analyst. At Econ One, Kshama was involved in conducting data analysis and microeconomic research for consumer overcharge and damage estimation in anti-trust litigation cases. Prior to working at Econ One India, Kshama was an Assistant Manager at EXL Services, an analytics company. As a part of the Decisions Analytics team at EXL, Kshama worked on customer survey response assessments and conducting econometric analyses for marketing campaigns. Kshama holds a Master’s in Financial Economics from Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune.

Rahul Jauhari

Customer Grievance Redressal

Rahul is the Customer Grievance Redressal Officer and team lead for CCEs for MFIN’s Customer Grievance Redressal Mechanism (CGRM). Rahul has been involved with financial services for the past 7 years. He started his career a loan officer with HDFC bank where he played a key role in the SHG/JLG formation and bank linkages, loan appraisal and documentation, and other SHG and JLG group management activities. He did his diploma ‘Triploma in Livelihood Promotion and Micro banking’ from Basix Academy in 2011. He also holds an MBA in Finance from Sikkim Manipal University. Through field visits and various projects, Rahul has had hands-on experience of financial inclusion services from field level upwards. He is also conversant in various banking software like Banksoft and Finacle.”

Ansh Gupta

Manager – SRO

Ansh is an Agricultural Engineer with MBA in Agribusiness Management from NIAM, Jaipur. He has a rich experience of working on diversified product offerings specially catering to the rural markets. Previously he was employed with HDFC Bank as Credit Manager for Sustainable Livelihood Initiative of the Bank, where he worked closely with the ground teams and managed the micro finance portfolio. Prior to HDFC Bank, he was associated with Escorts Ltd - a leading tractor manufacturer, where he was responsible for product planning and management of compact utility tractors for global markets.

Ashutosh Sharma

AVP-SRO

Ashutosh Sharma graduated from XLRI Jamshedpur in 2015 with an MBA in Marketing and Finance. Ashutosh has 9 years of banking experience in Axis Bank. Ashutosh formerly worked for Axis Bank's Government Business division, liaising with several government agencies and ministries on PFMS (Public Finance Management System) and GeM. Ashutosh used his PFMS knowledge to help the bank acquire business, engage with ministries and bring about customized solution engagements. As a part of his profile, Ashutosh was working on bridging the 32L Cr gap in the MSME credit market through the GeM Sahay platform – an industry first initiative at this scale. Ashutosh was leading the digital agenda on the retail side for Axis Bank in North India in its 1100 odd branches, directly responsible for architecting the roadmap for increasing mobile penetration amongst varied customer segments.

Ashutosh has also done volunteer work closely with the CEO of an established agri-tech startup which included streamlining operations across districts etc. Also working in advisory capacity with a D2C brand in the cosmetic space on future growth and expansion plans. Ashutosh is an avid public policy enthusiast and actively tracks all latest developments in sectors ranging from foreign policy, to economy to politics etc.

Shreeja Agrawal

Manager – SRO

Shreeja has worked within the social sector primarily in the education and women empowerment sector with Development Agency for Poor and Tribal (DAPTA), an NGO in Kalahandi district of Odisha. Further, she has also worked as a facilitator at Teach India, Times of India. Shreeja holds a master’s degree from the Business School of University of Edinburgh whereby she specialized in financial analysis and management. Prior to that, she did her graduation and post-graduation in History from Indraprastha College for Women, University of Delhi.

Achla Savyasaachi

Head - State Initiatives

Achla has been working with MFIN since April 2014 and is responsible for looking after the state and regional chapters. Prior to MFIN she has worked with Sa-Dhan, the Association of Community Development Finance Institutions for thirteen years where she contributed extensively for the growth of financial inclusion in urban and rural India across models, facilitated dialogue between different stakeholders-people, policy makers, service providers for better understanding of diverse models. She is a qualified Company Secretary and has also done her law from CCS University.

Radhika Agashe

Deputy State Head - State Initiatives

Radhika specializes in the thematic areas of financial and business education and microfinance policy and practice including social performance management. Prior to MFIN, she was part of ACCESS ASSIST, leading the organization’s work - convening the sectoral Inclusive Finance India platform, leading field-based projects in financial and business capability building and providing technical assistance and consulting. She has conceived and coordinated various policy discussions and state of practice studies for promoting an enabling institutional and regulatory framework for financial inclusion.

In the past, she has been associated with many organizations of repute such as EDA Rural Systems, BASIX, Intellecap, Action for Social Advancement and Sambodhi Research & Communications. She holds a Post Graduate degree from the Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM).

Jatinder Handoo

VP – State Initiatives ( Northern Region)

Jatinder, a trained banking, and public policy professional has an industry work experience of over 15 years . At MFIN, he is responsible for facilitating ease of doing business for MFIN’s member institutions engaged in micro and MSME finance by managing strategic alliances with Senior Bureaucrats, Policy Makers, Banking Regulator, Law, and Order Enforcement agencies and manages matters related to legal litigations etc. His past work in senior managerial capacity spans from agribusiness value chain finance, fintech-consulting and sales , Business Correspondent (BC Model) operations and Microfinance Social Performance Management (SPM) in Asia and the Eastern Europe at financial institutions like State Bank of India, HDFC Bank Ltd, FINO-Payments Bank, Microfinance Information Exchange (MIX Market) etc. He provided short term investee due diligence and project research-support to devfin institutions like Oiko Credit India (Maanveeya) & APMAS and was associated with prominent public policy think tanks like Centre for Policy Research , Centre for Civil Society and Centre for Research on Innovation and Science Policy where his policy research reports were published in prominent publications.

Jatinder has pursued master’s in public policy from India. He is an alumnus of IIM Udaipur-Sanford School of Public Policy ,Duke university, USA. He was selected under the MasterCard Foundation Microfinance Scholars Program to study community-based microfinance at the prestigious COADY International Institute Canada. He has also studied financial regulations, digital and SME-microfinance at institutions like the Luxembourg University, Fletchers School at the Tufts University, USA. He has been a speaker and presenter at global platforms like e-MFP Luxembourg, CYFI Amsterdam, CEGA-Berkeley etc. Jatinder is an ILA certified life coach and a Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) practitioner.

He is an avid video-blogger and writer and loves travelling and reading non-fiction books. His thought leadership pieces on financial inclusion related topics have been published on platforms like CGAP, IFMR , Next Billion blogs and The Financial Express etc. A case study on Branchless Banking in India co-authored by him is listed on the Harvard Business School Publishing Centre.

Rama Kamaraju

Head - State Initiatives

Rama is a seasoned professional with nearly thirty years of experience in Human Capital Development, Structural Reforms, Policy, Governance and Measurement frameworks. His work experience covers Government, Private Sector, Self-Regulatory Body, and quasi-government organisations. In his last engagement, he was Senior Advisor at NITI Aayog, wherein he spearheaded flagship programmes like Aspirational Districts Programme, NGO Darpan and Measurement of Digital economy.

Prior to NITI, he was with National Institution for Smart Government (NISG) and worked extensively on government process re-engineering for improving the Ease of Doing Business in the country. He had also carried out regulatory function at the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, a statutory and self-regulatory organisation, which includes the amendments to the Chartered Accountants Act and the Regulations framed thereunder.

Rama holds a double Masters - Masters in Management from Asian Institute of Management, Manila and in Applied Statistics from Osmania University, Hyderabad. He also holds a Certification in Machine Learning from Stanford online.

He is a regular contributor in the leading dailies on topics related to social sector, business environment and national accounts.

Habib Shaik

SVP - East & North East Region

Habib is a finance expert with sixteen years of experience. Prior to MFIN, he was associated with Sa-Dhan (The Association of Community Development Finance Institutions) as a “Senior Executive-State coordinator”, responsible for the member services of North-East and Eastern region (viz. Assam, Manipur, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh).An MBA graduate from Bangalore University, he has also worked for seven years in the retail finance and 9 years in Microfinance. He has also been recognised as a “Smart Assessor” by the “Smart Campaign”.

PM Kamalesh

VP - Southern Region

Kamalesh has over twelve years of rich experience. Prior to MFIN, Kamalesh has worked with Sa-Dhan (The Association of Community Development Finance Institutions) as Regional Manager responsible for the member services of south region (Viz Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka).

He has completed an online course of Social Enterprise and Microfinance Experts from University of Libre de Bruxelles. Kamalesh has pursued his MBA in Finance from National Institute of Business Management, BA in Economics from Annamalai University and Software Engineering from Computer Maintenance Corporation.

Devendra Shahapurkar

AVP - Western Region

Devendra is a seasoned management professional with 12 years of diverse experience. Prior to joining MFIN, he was associated with Fino Payments Bank and played instrumental role in product innovations and distribution of insurance products. He successfully led Microinsurance Innovation Project of International Labor Organization at Fino with multiple stakeholders; and also awarded with Best Innovative Business Initiative.He has also worked with Richcore Lifesciences, Span Outsourcing and Everonn Systems. He is an Engineering graduate with PGDBM in Marketing and Finance. He is a member of AIMA and Licentiate in Life and General Insurance from Insurance Institute of India.

Sanjay Kumar

AVP - Bihar & Jharkhand

Sanjay has over twenty one years of experience within microfinance and rural development industry. Prior to MFIN, he was associated with institutions like Sarvodaya Nano Finance Limited, Bhartiya Samruddhi Finance Ltd. and Indian Grameen Services – BASIX where he worked across 18 districts of Bihar & Jharkhand. He also worked as ‘National Resource Person – IB/CB’ for Madhya Pradesh Rural Livelihood Mission on behalf of NIRDPR, MoRD, Government of India. At BASIX he worked as an AVP & State Head in the states of Madhya Pradesh & Chhattisgarh. He started his career with ASSEFA where he initiated the livelihood promotional activities through mobilization of Gram Sabha/ ULBs/ PRIs and Women Self Help Group. He has worked with NGOs partners, MFIs, NBFCs, Community Based Microfinance Institutions and coordinated programme implementation.

He has the expertise of planning, implementation , management, partnerships development , policy advocating, monitoring and evaluation of large scale programmes.

Dhiraj Soni

VP - Central Region

An astute & result oriented professional with 19 years of rich experience in strategic planning, business development, collection as well as team management within banking and financial sector. Prior to MFIN, he was associated with SRG Housing Finance as a “Head Collections”, responsible for Collections vertical of Rajashan,MP,Maharastra and Gujarat region . He has pursued his graduation from Barkatullah University.

Deepika Singh

Vice President – Communication & PR

Deepika is a seasoned communication professional with over 17 years of experience in corporate roles. She holds an undergraduate degree from Miranda House, Delhi University(2004) and Masters in Business from IMT, Ghaziabad. Further she secured first position in the PG Diploma program in Communication at Bhartiya Vidya Bhawan in 2007.

Prior to joining MFIN, she was associated with Shriram Capital Ltd. in the capacity of General Manager, Corporate Communication , where she demonstrated expertise across the entire communication spectrum. Deepika’s career trajectory includes valuable stints in corporates, laying a robust foundation for her subsequent success in Communication.

In addition to her corporate journey, Deepika is a certified Happiness Coach, reflecting her commitment to holistic well-being. She has been a faculty member at Bhawan’s , her PG Diploma alma mater. Her dedication to philanthropy is evident through her active engagement in community building, environmental sustainability initiatives , mentoring & guiding millennials.

Bhumika Panda

AVP- Communications

Bhumika, a Marketing and Corporate Communication professional has an experience of over 13 years and has worked on assignments related to brand strategy and communications. As a Marketing Communication professional, she has worked with various brands & assisted them in co-creating new go-to-market & media strategies. Her core expertise includes media planning, integrated media properties, advertising campaigns, events & experiential activities, curating communication collaterals, public relation, branding activities, social media marketing etc.

She has been employed with MFIN since 2017. Prior to MFIN she has worked with various Media & Advertising agencies including Edelman India, Dentsu Aegis India Network, Group M Media India, and Reliance Broadcast Network ( 92.7 Big FM). Bhumika has completed her Post Graduation in Public Relation and Event Marketing from Amity School of Communication, Amity University and graduated from Symbiosis Society’s College of Arts and Commerce specialising in English Literature.

She had won a Bronze Award at Media Abby Awards (Goa Fest – 2012) for the campaign SBK (Fight against Diarrhoea). Bhumika is a vivid traveller, mountain lover and enjoys exploring cuisines and food joints across.

Sharad Garg

VP – Finance & Operations

Sharad has been working with MFIN since July 2016 and heads the operations department (Finance, HR, IT and Admin). Prior to joining MFIN, he worked with Oxfam India, India HIV / AIDS Alliance, Sasakawa India Leprosy Foundation and Integrated Research and Action for Development (IRADe). He has twenty years of experience in finance management, grants management, statutory compliances, legal contract vetting and procurement management. He holds an MBA degree in Finance and also graduated in law (LL.B). He completed certification courses in Corporate Governance and Applied Financial Risk Management.

Vijay Wadhwa

AVP - Northern Region

Vijay Wadhwa has over 13 years of experience in microfinance and the rural development industry. Prior to MFIN, he was associated with DCB Bank Ltd. as a State Head, responsible for the Microfinance Business and BC relationship in Bhopal and Indore, Madhya Pradesh and coordination with MFI/NBFC Headquarters in Delhi NCR and Gurgaon, Haryana. He also worked with Yes Bank for 7 years and handled the Microfinance business in Rajasthan and Haryana.

He started his career with a Non-Govt Organization where he was involved in Credit Linkage Project for funding from banks to JLG and SHGs members.

He has expertise in sales and business development, planning, implementation, management, partnerships development, monitoring and evaluation of large scale programmes. Vijay Wadhwa has pursued his MBA in Marketing & Finance from IET University, Rajasthan, and B Com from Rajasthan University.

Manjunatha MS

AVP - Southern Region

Manjunatha has over 23 years of experience in Social and Human Resource Development. Manjunatha was a consultant at United Nations Development Program for Karnataka State Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM, NRETP & DDUGKY). Prior to that, he was associated with Navachetana Group and has led the HR vertical. He also led community connect - social vertical while working with the Jana Group and has worked with urban, rural and tribal communities through Child Focused Community Development (comprehensive community development project) during his association with Christ University.

Manjunatha has completed his Strategic Human Resource Management certificate program from Indian Institute of Management – Kozhikode and holds post-graduation in Social Work and Kannada Literature.

Swapnil Lal

Finance Manager

Swapnil joined MFIN in August 2023 and is a core member of the finance team. Earlier, he was associated with World Vision India, Emmanuel Hospital Association and other Not-for-profit organizations. He has an experience of more than 20 years in grants management, statutory compliance and finance management. He holds degrees in Commerce (M.Com) and Social Work (MSW). He has also completed a post-graduate diploma in human resource development.

Vijay Kumar

Manager - Administration

Vijay is Manager - Administration. At MFIN, he undertakes Administration, travel and hospitality arrangements for the employees of the Secretariat and the Board Members in view of the Association’s operations pan India. He brings with him 13 years of experience in Customer Service, Operations and Business Management. Starting his career with Interglobe Technologies, Vijay worked with prestigious organizations like American Express, Kuoni Travel India and Yatra Online. Prior to joining MFIN, Vijay was working as Manager – Operations at FCM Travel Solutions.

Shantnu Kumar

Executive

Shantnu has more than 7th years of experience in financial management and Administration both the corporate and social sectors. Prior to MFIN, Shantnu has worked with LIFE, Tuli International Pvt Ltd, and Sanjeev Bhargava & Associates. He holds double masters - MCom & MBA and completed CA-intern from ICAI. He has a keen interest in various branches of law, especially corporate laws like the Companies Act, PMLA, FCRA, etc. He is interested in staying updated on technology. Completed power BI, Power point, Advance excel & Advance AI course from IRA Edutech company.

At MFIN, from September 2016 to 31st March 2024 handled the portfolios of Finance, Accounts, and Admin. Currently posted in the State Initiatives vertical.

Mr. Sudarshan Sen

Former Executive Director at Reserve Bank of India

Mr. Sudarshan retired from the Reserve Bank of India as Executive Director in charge of regulation of banks and non-banking financial companies. In a career spanning over 36 years with the Reserve Bank, he worked in several areas, including banking regulation, bank supervision, fintech regulation, human resources, information technology, and currency management. He has been on several major national and international committees; he has served as the Reserve Bank’s nominee on the Supervision and Implementation Group and the Policy Development Group of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and was a member of the Committees which drafted and subsequently reviewed India’s Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code. He hasalso chaired the Inter-Regulatory Working Group on Fintech and the Working Group on Implementation of Ind AS by Banks,constituted by the Reserve Bank of India.

He holds a master’s degree in Mathematics from Delhi University and an MBA in International Banking and Finance from the University of Birmingham, UK.

Dr. Harsh Kumar Bhanwala

Former Chairman, NABARD.

Dr. Harsh Kumar Bhanwala is the Executive Chairman of Capital India Finance Limited, an India-focused, integrated financial services company since August 2020. Capital India is a listed company, categorized as a systemically important NBFC by RBI.

Dr. Bhanwala is also on the Board of Governors of Indian Institute of Management, Rohtak, a premier management institute of India.

Prior to joining Capital India Finance Limited, Dr Bhanwala was the Chairman of National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), anApex Development Bank. Over these six and half years, under his stewardship, the assets of NABARD increased from USD 37 billion to USD 74 billion and the institution took significant steps to fulfil its mandate.

Dr. Bhanwala was also the Vice Chairman of Asia-Pacific Rural and Agricultural Credit Association (APRACA). He was on the Board of the Deposit Insurance & Credit Guarantee Corporation (DICGC), IRMA (Institute of Rural Management Anand) and the National Institute of Bank Management (NIBM), premier institutes of India. He also headed multiple subsidiaries of NABARD which target to reach the last mile through credit and advisory services.

Prior to joining NABARD, he was Executive Director and for a brief period Chairman cum Managing Director Infrastructure Finance Company Ltd (IIFCL). He pioneered the development of credit enhancement product for infrastructure finance, the first of its own kind in India.

He is a Postgraduate in Management from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad and holds a Ph.D. in Management as well. He has been awarded honorary doctorate in Science by Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, and Indian Council of Agricultural Research-Central Institute of Fisheries Education (ICAR-CIFE), Mumbai.

Mr. Deepak Singhal

Former Executive Director at Reserve Bank of India

Prior to joining MFIN, Mr Deepak Singhal had an illustrious career with the Reserve Bank of India, retiring from the institution as Executive Director in 2019.

In his career spanning 37 years, Mr Singhal steadily rose the ladder with his hard work and foresight, gaining a multifaced experience in various banking departments including regional RBI offices. In 2003, he assumed charge as the General Manager and Head of Office, RBI, Mumbai. He was instrumental in issuance of detailed guidelines on implementation of Basel III and also in the assessment of additional capital requirements for Indian Banks to meet Basel III minimum ratio till March 2018. In his role as Head – Human Resource Development, he introduced many modern HR practices in the RBI and also contributed as Member Secretary in committees that foresaw human resource development in the Banking Industry through institutes like the IGIDR, NIBM and CAFRAL.

Mr Singhal holds a Bachelor’s and a Master’s Degree from the Allahabad University.

Dr Kshama Fernandes

Non-Executive Vice Chairperson - Northern Arc Group

Dr. Kshama Fernandes is the Non-Executive Vice Chairperson of the Northern Arc Group and Executive Chairperson of Northern Arc Investment Managers. Northern Arc is a leading finance platform in India that connects underbanked institutions and businesses to capital markets investors. Kshama served as the Managing Director and CEO of Northern Arc Capital from 2012 to 2022. Deeply respected for her knowledge and commitment towards the cause of unleashing the power of finance for the greater good, Kshama has been a member of various High Powered Committees setup by the Government of India and has worked on consulting assignments for the World Bank, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Ministry of Finance, Government of India, and NSEIT. She has over 25 years of experience spanning across management, risk advisory and academia. Dr. Fernandes is a financial risk manager certified by the Global Association of Risk Professionals (GARP). Prior to joining Northern Arc, she was a professor at the Goa Institute of Management. She has also served as Chief Risk Officer of Northern Arc from 2009 to 2012.

Kshama has been featured by FMO as a role model in banking. She is also a recipient of Accion’s Edward W. Claugus award for leadership in financial inclusion. She holds a bachelor’s degree in science, a master’s degree as a well as a PhD in management studies.

Post-Andhra Pradesh crisis in 2010, a high-level committee, known as Malegam Committee, was formed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to thoroughly examine the issues of the microfinance sector. Most of the recommendations of the Malegam Committee were accepted by the RBI by introducing a new category of NBFCs named NBFC-MFIs in Dec 2011, with detailed directions on a gamut of things including a definition of NBFC-MFIs through qualifying assets criterion, prudential norms, pricing of credit and customer protection measures such as pricing of credit, disclosures and multiple-lending and over-lending.

Recommendation of the Malegam Committee ‘for greater responsibility to be placed on industry associations for monitoring of regulatory compliance’ was adopted through a separate SRO guideline issued in November 2013 for recognition of industry associations as the Self-regulatory Organization’.

Accordingly, Master Directions for the NBFC-MFIs were revised to include SRO function, as under:

• All NBFC-MFIs are encouraged to become member of at least one Self-Regulatory Organization (SRO) which is recognized by the Reserve Bank and will also have to comply with the Code of Conduct prescribed by the SRO.
• The responsibility for compliance to all regulations prescribed for MFIs lies primarily with the NBFC-MFIs themselves. The industry associations/SROs will also play a key role in ensuring compliance with the regulatory framework.

In June 2014, MFIN became the first industry association to be accorded recognition as an SRO by the RBI.

Like many other countries, modern micro-credit/microfinance industry in India started in 1990s inspired by the Grameen Model of Prof Mohammad Yunus in Bangladesh. Overtime, as this model evolved and became successful, it boosted the confidence of customers, MFIs and other stakeholders and started to scale-up.

From 2005-6, many non-profit MFIs converted into for-profit NBFCs and many new for-profit NBFCs also entered the micro-credit business, attracting private capital, commercialization, professionalism, and scale. This fuelled growth, competition, scale with a sharp focus on specialization in delivering micro-credit efficiently and profitably. As a result, within 5 years, the micro-credit industry in India increased multi-fold to reach an outstanding of nearly Rs 20,000 Cr. However, this period also witnessed the challenges around customer-protection including over-leverage, inadequate disclosures, lack of customer awareness, high pricing as well as risks of geographic concentration, ghosts’ loans, local-level interferences and lack of regulations and oversight.

Recognizing this, Reserve Bank of India (Central Bank of India), introduced a new category of NBFCs called NBFC-MFIs in Dec 2011 with specific regulations for the micro-credit sector, focusing on customer protection. On the back of these regulations, the industry had a hugely successful decade.

Today, the micro-credit sector is diverse and competitive with over 100 regulated players – Banks, SFBs, NBFC-MFIs and NBFCs. To ensure a level playing field, in March 2022, the RBI introduced the harmonised guidelines creating an entity agnostic but activity-based regulation. A clear regulatory framework, a sound underlying business model, performance trends overtime, and potentially large un- met demand has attracted private capital to sustain the growth.

As a result, micro-credit in India remains one of the largest micro-credit sectors globally, quite unmatched in terms of its outreach with low-ticket loans, scale, diversity of supply-side, spread, efficiency, performance, customer-protection standards, and contribution of the private sector.