Ambuja Foundation board of directors and executive committee

Narotam Sekhsaria is a leader in the Indian Cement Industry. In a career spanning over 35 years, he introduced new standards in manufacturing, management, marketing efficiency and corporate social responsibility to an industry he helped transform. He started Ambuja Cement Foundation with the firm belief that community development is core to business sustainability. He is particularly concerned about the economic progress, efficiencies and sustainable livelihoods of rural people and has encouraged ACF to focus on water resource management, projects for farmers like the Better Cotton Initiative, and also skill training for rural youth. He is the Chairman of Narotam Sekhsaria Foundation, Director, JM Financial ARC and Everest Industries Limited and a Board Member of Indian Institute of Crafts & Design, Jaipur.

P K Laheri, IAS (RETD.) was recruited into the 1969 batch of the Gujarat cadre. He retired as Chief Secretary in March 2005. He also served as Chairman and Managing Director of Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Limited, Gandhinagar. He held many positions in industry, education, information, water supply, fashion, tourism and rural development during his career. He is working with many trusts to help the underprivileged and also helps many companies to plan and implement CSR projects.

Ashni Biyani is the Managing Director of Future Consumer Limited, an FMCG company designed to cater to the fast moving consumer generation. Over the course of the last four years, the company has developed over 24 brands in new and niche categories across food, home and personal care products. With an interest in human behaviour, she works on behavioural changes that help transform ideas into conceptualized final forms. She has a passion for studying society and culture and takes time out for writing articles released in leading publications.

Vijay Kumar Sharma was the former Chairman of Life Insurance Corporation of India and prior to that he was the Managing Director of LIC of India and LIC Housing Finance Limited. He comes with over 37 years of experience in the insurance sector and held various challenging assignments pan India. He has a great understanding of the demographics of the country and socio- economic needs of different regions. He has vast Board level experience on national and international level. He was the Director of ACC Ltd. and is currently on the Board of Tata Steel Ltd., Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd., Reliance Power Ltd., and the Chairman of ICEX Ltd.

Padmini Sekhsaria is a principal at the Narotam Sekhsaria Family Office where she leads several investment and philanthropic activities. She oversees businesses in technology, education, FMCG, agriculture, construction materials, commodities and financial services, that directly employ over 3600 employees. Her development experience in youth education, health and vocational skilling, spans over 20 years. She started Salaam Bombay Foundation, which works with over 3 million children across India. She leads the Narotam Sekhsaria Foundation, and serves on other non-profit boards, like Aga Khan Health Services India and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health-India Center. She is an alumnus of London School of Economics and has a MSc. in Financial Economics.

B. L. Taparia is a Commerce and Law graduate and a Fellow Member of the Institute of Company Secretaries of India. He possesses more than 40 years of experience in the fields of Legal, Secretarial, Finance, Taxation, Procurement, Internal Audit, HR, Health & Safety, and Sustainability. He worked with Ambuja Cements Limited for 31 years, 11 years as Whole-time Director. Post superannuation, he was appointed as Non-Independent Director on the Board of Ambuja Cement Ltd which he continued up to March 2019. He is also an Independent Director in Everest Industries Limited.

Ajay Kapur is an economics graduate from St. Xavier’s University, Mumbai and an MBA from K.J. Somaiya Institute of Management. He has also attended the Advanced Management Programme at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Kapur has been actively involved in various industry forums including CII, FICCI and ASSOCHAM. Mr. Ajay Kapur has 25+ years of experience in the cement and construction, power and heavy metals sector. He joined Ambuja Cement in 1993 as an Executive Assistant to the then Managing Director. He held various strategic positions over the last 2 decades and from 2014 to 2019, he served as the CEO and Managing Director of the Company. Prior to joining the Adani Group in June 2022, Mr. Ajay Kapur was CEO - Aluminium and Power and MD – Commercial at Vedanta Ltd. Most recently he served as CEO of Special Projects at Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd.

Pearl Tiwari is the Director and CEO of Ambuja Cement Foundation and President (CSR & Sustainability) at Ambuja Cements Limited. With 35 years of experience in the development sector, she is a social development professional having worked in this area across diverse academic, NGO and CSR roles. A graduate from the prestigious Tata Institute of Social Sciences, and with an Executive Education in CSR from Harvard Business School, she has led Ambuja Cement Foundation since 2000. Leading a team of development professionals, her efforts have earned Ambuja Cements national and international recognition in CSR.

With 37 years of experience in the development sector, Pearl Tiwari is a social development professional having worked in this area across diverse academic, NGO and CSR roles. A post-graduate from Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), she completed the Executive Education course in CSR from the Harvard Business School in 2008 and the Management Programme in Sustainability from Stockholm, Sweden in 2010. Pearl joined Ambuja in 2000 and ever since has been at the helm of nurturing Ambuja Cement Foundation that has expanded from a fledging team to nearly 1200 development professionals it now boasts of today, with a pan-India presence active in 50 districts across 12 states. Ambuja’s CSR efforts has been recognised widely and the recent years has seen a slew of national and international awards for CSR, water management, and skill training bestowed by different chambers of commerce and other organisations of repute.

Chandrakant Kumbhani has over 20 years of experiences in rural development sector. He has been working at ACF for more than 11 years. Prior to joining ACF, he worked for Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (India) a developmental organization for more than 9 years in different region and positions. He joined as project coordinator at Ambujanagar in 2005 and in subsequent years, he took over as Programme Manager for Ambujanagar, Area Manager for Gujarat and currently overseeing community development programme as General Manager. His interest areas are water, agriculture based livelihoods and community based institutions. He graduated in Agricultural Engineering from Gujarat Agriculture University, Junagadh in 1996. He was selected as one of the 20 professionals from India to undergo fully sponsored Swedish Institute Management Programme on Sustainability graduating with a Diploma in Sustainability in 2013.

Ravi heads the Skill Training division of Ambuja Cements Foundation (ACF). He holds a B.Tech degree in agricultural engineering and has over two decades of experience in the field of development with various NGOs. Ravi started his career with an NGO way back in 1993, working as a Technical Consultant in lift, drip irrigation and water conservation. He has coordinated in developmental projects funded by government bodies, foreign agencies and corporates. Ravi joined ACF in 2001 at Chandrapur, Maharashtra and took charge of the CSR program of Ambuja Cements Ltd. Chandrapur plant is mainly responsible for community development work in the surrounding villages around plant and gradually in a span of eight years the area increased to more than 100 villages in two blocks of the district. Areas of intervention are community health, education, water resource development, women empowerment, agriculture development and infrastructural development. He then worked as a Regional Program Manager for ACF for Chattisgarh, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh. Since 2009, he has been heading the vocational training division of ACF covering 16 institutes, spread across 10 states in the country. Through this skill training, ACF has trained over 25,000 youth in various sectors and provided placement to 74% trained youth.

Manoj Agarwal has been contributing his expertise since April 2007 and has been in the sector over the past two decades. Manoj holds a post-graduate degree in Soil & Water Conservation Engineering from IIT-Kharagpur and Bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Engineering. With his expertise in water resource management and livelihoods, currently holds a senior leadership position in the organization and manages the development programs in two large geographies of Rajasthan and Eastern region. He is a member of various forums and committees like the “CII National Committee on Water”, the “FICCI State-level committee on HR and skills”, and the “District Mineral Foundation Trust” for the Pali district of Rajasthan, which speaks volumes about his commitment to contributing to the sector. He is known for his strategic thinking, problem-solving skills, and his ability to build strong partnerships with stakeholders. He has a proven track record of driving change through various collaborations and innovations. With his vast experience and deep understanding of the development sector, his contributions have been instrumental in driving the organization's growth and achieving notable success stories on the ground.

A senior professional with over 24 years of versatile experience in the social development sector, Anagha Mahajani is the Head of Program Impacts at Ambuja Cement Foundation. She brings significant contribution in perspective building, design & development of projects, strategies and implementation plans. She is an alumni of Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai and is a faculty with the Urban Rural Community Development (URCD) department at the Institute. She is a professional trainer in monitoring and research and conducts theme based trainings for professionals in the development sector. Anagha has over 16 years of working with NGO activity involved in different development/social sectors and with a varied section of the society followed by 10 years of Corporate CSR. She is known to have the ability to perceive social and environment outcomes/impacts of the projects and sensitise stakeholders keeping in mind the larger society. She is an effective communicator and has a strong hold over facilitating effective team functioning.

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OUR PEOPLE WE ARE ONLY AS GOOD AS THE PEOPLE WHO DRIVE US