MAHATMA AWARD
महात्मा पुरस्कार
September 2024 New York, United States | October 2024 New Delhi, India | December 2024 London, UK
Board of Advisors and Mentors
We are privileged to have the support, expertise, and connections offered by our diverse Board of Advisors and mentors. These high-level personalities support Mahatma Awards with their experience, their contacts and their wealth of ideas. All members of the Advisory Board participate in their personal capacity. You can get to know this inspiring group of people by clicking on the Linkedin icon and reading their stories below.
Lt Gen Rajender Singh
Former Dir. Gen. Infantry,
UN Force Cdr. & CEO
DLF Foundation
Lt Gen Rajender Singh, Former Director Gen of Infantry, UN Force Cdr and Former CEO of DLF Foundation has a distinguished record both in the field of National Security, Peacekeeping and social sector . Gen Singh was commissioned in the KUMAON Regiment and has held a number of important assignments like, Force Commander of the United Nations Peace Keeping Forces in Ethiopia & Eritrea and Chief of Staff of Northern Command. A recipient of PVSM the country's highest Distinguished Service Award, Gen. Singh retired from the army in Dec 2008 as Director General of Infantry (the largest arm of the Indian Army).
As a social innovator, Lt Gen Singh had been instrumental in expanding the programmes of DLF Foundation from its infancy stage in 2009, to become one of the leading Foundation in the country with a large number of National and International awards including Golden Peacock Award to its credit. In addition, he has himself been honoured with a numerous corporate awards including LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD by ABP NEWS on Lt Gen Rajender Singh for his contribution in social sector.
Mohini Daljeet Singh
CEO
Max India Foundation
Mohini Daljeet Singh, a social worker and an educationist, is widely travelled. She started her social service journey by volunteering as a student with Mother Teresa’s Home “Prem Niwas”, in Lucknow, where she learnt her lessons of compassion and selfless social giving. An army daughter and army wife, she has spent more than three decades on “hands-on” social and welfare work to benefit army families in the health, education and personal counselling areas
As CEO of Max India Foundation, Mohini Daljeet Singh has worked for the underprivileged on the health platform benefitting 26 Lakh beneficiaries at 704 locations and partnering with 410 NGOs. The Foundation has adopted two villages in Uttarakhand in 2015 for intervention on the issue of health and hygiene. Mohini has also represented Max India Foundation as a panellist and anchor at various CSR platforms in India and abroad, including that of CII, ASSOCHAM, PHD Chamber of Commerce, CSR Live week, BRICS CCI centre for CSR and IICA.
Under her stewardship as the founding CEO, Max India Foundation has won several awards including the Golden Peacock Award for CSR for four consecutive years. Recently she has been awarded 'Best Women Leadership Excellence award in CSR' at The South Asian Partnership Summit & Business Awards held in Colombo. Earlier, she received the award for "Excellent Social Accomplishments" by ‘Samast Bharat’. The award was given away by His Holiness Dalai Lama at Dharamsala.
Dr. Lalit Kumar
Ex- Advisor Planning Commission
Hony Senior Adviser,
Sulabh International
Dr Lalit is Hony. Senior Vice President and advisor with Sulabh International for last four years. Earlier as Adviser Planning Commission he dealt mainly with policy issues for the Voluntary Sector and also looked after sectors like: Environment & Forests, Project Appraisal & Management, Social Development and Youth Affairs & Sports, in different capacities.
Niti Aayog invited him as an expert to contribute for drafting the ‘15 Year Vision Document’, acknowledged in the ‘Three Years Action Agenda (2017-20). He has also served as Secretary, National Foundation for Communal Harmony, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India, shaping the Foundation into an effective organization. Dr. Lalit conducted Post-Doctoral Research at the University of Arizona, USA and at the Newberry Library, Chicago, USA. He is Ph.D. (Anthropology) from the University of Delhi and M.Sc. (Economics) from the University of Wales, UK. Dr. Lalit has published two books and more than 50 Papers in national and international journals.
Dr K K Upadhyay
Former Head - Corporate Social Responsibility at FICCI,
Ex - NDDB
Dr. K. K. Upadhyay, an alumnus of Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA), is a seasoned professional with over three decades of experience across government, not-for-profits and corporate. He has pioneered several innovative successful models that exist in the development sector today; including Mother Dairy Fruits and Vegetable - “Safal”; an integrated rural water supply, sanitation project for 1000 villages and 10 towns in Rajasthan – “Aapni Yojana”; Bastar Integrated Development Project for Royal Danish Embassy and Health of the urban poor program for USAID/ PFI.
He has been an expert with Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs, was on board of National Trust, Jan Sthirta Kosh, Global Compact Network. He has conducted and commissioned research studies for USAID, UNDP and IIED London. Dr. Upadhyay headed the FICCI Aditya Birla CSR Centre for Excellence.
Anuradha Bhavnani
Senior Leader with Experience in Sustainability, Inclusive business, Innovation,Philanthropy SDGS and CSR
Ex Head Shall Foundation
A Business professional with a wide range of experience with Start-ups, Social Enterprise and Sustainability. Her strength is in co-creating, working with early stage start-ups to grow them to scale, supporting innovation and disruptive models, building strategic collaborations and networks and connecting the dots. She has built partnerships with organizations on shared value, Corporate Social responsibility and sustainable supply chains and leveraged multi stakeholder platforms.
She is Thought leader, Angel investor, Mentor and Board member and Advisor to many start-ups. Over the last 13 years she has worked at Shell Foundation with start-ups, social enterprises, not for profits, government, DFIs, multilaterals and corporates. She has built innovative solutions for access to energy, sustainable supply chains, access to finance, sustainable transport that have impacted millions. She is a post graduate in Business Administration.
Adil Firoze
Advisor and Independent Consultant
Former GM, Corporate Affairs & CSR,
Engineers India Limited
Adil, with vast enriching experience of 30 years in the hydrocarbon sector in Engineering Design and Project Management followed by 10 years experience in Corporate Quality Assurance, Enterprise Risk Management, Corporate Communications and Corporate Social Responsibility. Mr. Firoze’s expertise includes Quality Management, Project Management, Corporate Communication and CSR. He is a workplace coach and trainer.
Mr. Firoze was representative of EIL in many standard drafting committees of BIS and also represented India along with BIS team in the 28th plenary meeting of ISO/TC 176 in Beijing, China during 24th – 29th October, 2011 for the development of ISO:10004 from DIS (Draft International Standard stage) to FDIS (Final Draft International Standard Stage) on monitoring and measurement of Customer Satisfaction.
Ravneet (singh) Gill
Group Head , CSR ,
Apollo Hospitals Group
As the Group Head CSR, Apollo Hospitals , Ravneet heads the entire CSR portfolio of Hospitals group. It includes various initiatives like SACHI( saving the child health initiative), Billion Hearts Beating Foundation, Total Health, health camps, Doctor charities, partnerships with external organisations like WWF, Pinkathon, etc.
Key responsibilities include budget allocation to each of the programs, initiatives and partnerships and prepare the annual strategy to the board and the CSR committee. He also supervise the execution of each of the programs and ensuring timely delivery, coordination between all stakeholders and keeping the promoters updated on the same and also liaison with government bodies and other not-for -profit agencies to scale up the scope of outreach programs and raise funds.