Swades Team | Swades Foundation

Our Team

OUR TEAM
Our 300+ team is one with Swades’ overall mission of Rural Empowerment. Their energy on-field and perseverance in working under some really challenging conditions and ensuring the best outcomes for our rural communities is something that binds us all together in spirit and integrity.

Co-Founders

Co-Founder

Ronnie Screwvala

Ronnie Screwvala is a first-generation entrepreneur who started his journey by introducing India to multi-channel TV viewing by launching the first cable TV network in the country. From there, he went on to build a Media and Entertainment conglomerate spanning Television, Motion Pictures, Broadcasting, Games and Digital, that he listed in 2005 for a market cap of $ 55 million and that The Walt Disney Company bought in 2012 for an enterprise value of $1.4 billion.
 

Ronnie puts a great deal of emphasis on Social Welfare. He founded the Swades Foundation with a focus on rural India and adopted villages in Maharashtra to work on their self-sufficiency in water, health, education and livelihood. Through this foundation, he aims to impact one million rural lives every five years, with a clear exit/empowerment strategy from those villages and building a model for others to follow.
 

He also co-founded upGrad with a dream of establishing India as the teaching capital of the World. He aims to create an impact at scale by taking high-quality education to a large population. Simultaneously extend India’s soft power globally by upskilling more than 100 million knowledge economy workforce.

Co-Founder

Zarina Screwvala

Zarina Screwvala is a Co-founder of the Swades Foundation and works full time as its Managing Trustee/Director. Swades Foundation operates with the single-minded focus of empowering rural India through holistic and sustainable growth by engaging with and empowering village communities, executing multiple programmes on the ground and working towards an exit strategy, believing strongly in creating partnerships between Rural India, Corporates, Young India, the Government and other NGO’s for an irreversible change for good.
 
Swades Foundation has created a unique 360-degree model of development with nearly 300 full time staff, working in 2000+ hamlets impacting over half a million people across drinking water & sanitation, nutrition, health, education as well as a huge focus on progressive farming, animal husbandry, skilling & other livelihoods. Zarina is especially interested in Education that is joyful and empowering.
 
She pursues her passion for philosophy at New Acropolis (India North), which is a school of philosophy in the classical sense of investigating universal truth through a comparative study of ancient cultures and working to apply these principles to our own lives, in order to help make the world  a better place.
 
Zarina was also one of the Founder-Directors of UTV (now a part of the Walt Disney Company India), one of India’s foremost media and entertainment conglomerates, where she led the creation and launch of leading broadcast brands, including UTV Bindass, UTV Stars, UTV Action and Hungama TV in India and the children’s channel Astro Ceria in Indonesia & Malaysia.

Swades Team

Chief Executive Officer

Mangesh Wange

Mangesh has more than 27 years of General Management experience with P&L responsibility and in leading successful start-ups across multiple sectors and various organizations viz. Farm Inputs (Farm Machinery, Agri-Inputs, Animal Feeds & Micro Information), Retail and Micro Finance. Mangesh has rich experience in strategy formulation & implementation and worked for organic & inorganic growth of businesses.

 

Mangesh started his career in Sales & Distribution with Mahindra Tractors in 1987. He also headed the S&D of Agri Input Business at Godrej Agrovet. He conceptualized and started the modern retail businesses (Aadhaar and Nature’s Basket) at Godrej Agrovet Ltd. He has also worked in the Microfinance business at Fullerton India and later for Reuters Market Light at Thomson Reuters.

 

Before joining Swades, Mangesh was the Head, Animal Feeds Business at Godrej Agrovet Limited.

Chief Financial Officer, Director M&E and Donor Engagement

Amit Gupta

Amit holds 14 years of experience in Finance, Accounting & Governance , Revenue Management, Treasury Management, Financial Planning & Analysis, leading Finance ERP/Management reporting implementation projects and worked in multiple industries like Oil & Gas, Financial services, Commercial finance, Telecom and healthcare.

 

Before joining Swades he has been associated with organization like International SOS, Bharti Airtel, GE Capital, Genpact and Indian Oil Corporation. In his last assignment with International SOS, Amit was Financial Controller & responsible to manage India country P&L with the CEO.

 

Amit is a Chartered Accountant and a Commerce graduate.

Director – WATSAN

Bejoy Davis Chiramel

Bejoy has over 19 years of experience in Projects & Maintenance, Project Procurement, Managing Construction, renovations and Vendor Management. He has been associated with organizations like Blue Sky Luxury Apartments Pvt. ltd. as Construction Project Manager(Srilanka), with Nilgai Foods Pvt. Ltd. as Head of projects & maintenance (Mumbai), with Ka- Restaurants as AVP Projects and Maintenance, with Mirah Group as AGM Projects and Maintenance, with YUVA(NGO) as GM.

 

Bejoy has done B.E. (CIVIL) from Mumbai University.

Director – Education & Youth 360

Neeta Harmalkar

Neeta is a seasoned professional with over 16 years of experience, known for inspiring teams and driving organizational growth through people-focused development programs. As a Director, she possesses a unique blend of strategic acumen and hands-on leadership, consistently delivering high levels of employee and community satisfaction. Her diverse background includes teaching, training, and project management across various domains.

 

Since joining Swades in 2014, Neeta has played a pivotal role in driving the growth of two major verticals—Health and Education—within the organization. In her current role as Director of Economic Development at Swades Foundation, she is renowned for her approachable demeanor and strong interpersonal skills, making her widely recognized as a people’s person. Her leadership has been instrumental in implementing impactful initiatives that address critical community needs.

 

Neeta holds a post-graduate diploma in management and education (PGDME), along with an MA in Marathi Literature and Education. Early in her career, she dedicated herself to projects focused on HIV/AIDS awareness and women’s empowerment, collaborating closely with organizations such as UNICEF and Roshni Shikshan Prasarak Mandal. Her commitment to social causes and her ability to drive tangible results make her a valuable asset to any organization.

Director - 360 Degree

Pradip Sathe

Pradip holds a Master of Education degree from Aurangabad University. He started his career in 2004 as a teacher and moved on to a mentorship role by training teachers and re-enforcing quality education, over 68,947 teachers from 5000 Govt schools and private schools have been trained by him. Pradip was associated with Pearson Education Service Private Ltd. as a Project Manager for CSR projects for four years and during his tenure he served 3000 Zilla Parishad schools across all the districts of Maharashtra. He was a part of Bal Bharti, Bal Chitrawani & MSCERT (Maharashtra State Council of Educational Research & Training)team for content up gradation and approvals for Rural School Transformation. He was instrumental in organizing a mega event in State to create awareness about ‘Integrating ICT in Education in Rural Schools’. Pradip’s key skills include monitoring teacher training programs, managing stakeholder relationship, budgeting and implementation of projects.

Deputy Director - 360 Degree

Prasad Patil

With over two decades of experience in the development sector, Prasad has been a part of the Swades Foundation for the past 14 years. Contributing to Swades verticals like Community Mobilisation, Economic Development and Health, Prasad has been the representative of Swades Vision and Mission for all the visitors and donors. He is currently leading the L&D function along with other initiatives. Community Mobilization and Community Connect are his core expertise. In 2010, through Swades, he participated in an International Exchange Programme in Finland. Before joining the Swades Foundation, he has worked in various programmes like domestic violence and family counselling, community institutions and local self – governance. He has received recognition for his body of work in minimising domestic violence cases in Sindhudhurg district of Maharashtra by ex-Chief Minister of Maharashtra. Prasad holds a master’s degree in Social Work from CSIBER Kolhapur.

Director – HR & Administration

Rahul Katariya

Rahul comes in with a rich experience of 18 years which is an amalgamation of various functions like Training, Marketing, Operations and he started his HR journey in April 2007 with EXL.

 

He has a proven track record as HR Generalist profile which includes People Management, Performance Appraisal, Manpower Planning, Recruitment, MIS, Training and Development, etc. among other things. His expertise lies in partnering with Business units to develop overall business strategy and objectives and translating them into goals, plans and tactics.

 

He has completed his B.Com and MBA in Marketing from Pune University and has completed his PGCHRM from XLRI. Before joining Swades, Rahul was associated with MNCs like GE, EXL, WNS, Stream Global Services where he was the Director HR. Post Stream got acquired by Convergys in 2014, he was responsible for the HR Generalist profile for the West region in capacity of a Regional HR Business Partner, managing around 4500 employees based out of Mumbai, Thane and Pune.

Director – Special Project & Communications

Ranjish Kattady

At Swades, Ranjish has dual responsibility – firstly heading the HSBC Skills for Life programme, a 50 Cr investment by HSBC Bank to train and place over 30,000 youth across the country and secondly, heading the Health Vertical to ensure adequate access to public and private health services for our rural communities.

 

Ranjish has over 18 years of experience, spread across project conceptualization, project management and communications.

 

Before joining Swades Foundation, he spent two years heading the Mumbai operations of Times Foundation (CSR of the Times Group) and prior to which, over a decade with Sightsavers, an international development organization working to eliminate avoidable blindness and promote equality of opportunity for disabled people.

 

Over the 18 years, Ranjish has been involved in initiating and managing many projects – some in the difficult parts of Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal (especially in the Sundarbans). He has also implemented a multi-country training programme for Ophthalmologists and was involved in setting up tertiary care centers for Child Eye Cancer and Retinopathy of Prematurity at a premiere institute down south.

 

He has also been an enabler for fundraising and advocacy initiatives at Sightsavers, setting up the communication ecosystem for the organization.

Deputy Director – Government Affairs & Partnerships

Tushar Inamdar

A master in social work with over 19 years of experience in managing programmes across various social & rural themes – proven expertise in managing programmes for Corporate Social Responsibility, Rural development and Community development.
 
Tushar was the one of the first employees for Swades based out of Raigad and led the district team for 12 years. Thereafter, moved into community mobilization and resource mobilisation and now with the ‘Government Affairs and Partnerships’ team building a robust working partnership with the government and ensuring the people in our geography benefit from various government led schemes.
 
He presented a paper at an international conference in Hong Kong (2007) on conflict resolution among the target communities and was also the Indian representative at an international conference on ‘Rural Social Work’ held in China. He also participated in an International exchange program to Israel in 2010.
 
In 2013, he received Paul Harris Fellow (PHF) recognition through Rotary International for his most valuable contribution to integrated community development in India.

Director - Partnerships, CSR & Philanthropy

Tushar Sud

Tushar is an ex-banker /strategy consultant turned social development professional with 19+ years of management experience including the recent 7+ years in social organizational leadership. Since coming on board at the start of 2016, he has been heading partnerships around institutional giving, international grants & individual philanthropy at Swades.
 
His corporate career began with financial services in 2003, followed by strategy consulting & business development across MNC Banks such as JP Morgan, Royal Bank of Scotland and Deutsche Bank. In his social avatar – prior to joining Swades, he briefly led philanthropic & wealth partnerships at a social catalyst foundation. Tushar’s expertise is in strategic consulting, planning & analysis, business development, forging partnerships, client & stakeholder relationship management, and understanding of philanthropy & CSR. He is an MBA in Int’l Business from the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), New Delhi and a B.Com. from Panjab University, Chandigarh.
 
Rediscovering his passion with permanent social impact, he enjoys roles that inspire thinking around & out of the box and beyond. Having lived, studied & worked in various geographies, his other interests include travelling, trekking, mountains & open waters, meeting new people & sharing experiences, gourmet food, reading, music & playing the guitar.

General Manager - Marketing & Communications

Prashanti Mikayla

In Swades, Prashanti heads Marketing & Communications with the long-term goal of enhancing the share of voice for the organization to make it a preferred choice for donors and partners to associate with.
 
Prashanti brings to the table over 25 years of experience, straddling both the corporate and development sectors across communications, brand strategy, messaging, and narrative building, with a passion for human and organizational development, training, and L&D.
 
In her most recent 8-year stint with International Justice Mission, an organization working with the government to combat the crimes of human trafficking and bonded labour, Prashanti has developed a content strategy for messaging about the issue and built the narrative repository of the organization. Some of the other social causes which Prashanti has worked with include Gender Sensitization, Women and Children with AIDS, Community Development, Child Sponsorship and Prevention of Child Sexual Abuse. As a Communications professional, Prashanti has garnered experience with IT companies like Cisco Systems and has added to her repository with two years of agency experience.
 
Prashanti has been instrumental in setting up and managing the Communications ecosystem in several of the organizations she has worked with, giving her a 360-degree perspective of the function’s impact for excellence.

Deputy Director- Health

Dr Surendra Yadav

As a detail-oriented professional, he has more than 25 years of extensive experience in implementing Public Health and Development programs. His expertise lies in preparing a strategic plan for Public Health programs and strengthening the implementation of large-scale Public-Private Partnership programs. Throughout his career, he has worked with multiple stakeholders at the state and national level, including government departments, the private health sector, and bilateral organizations such as MSACS, CGSACS, UNICEF, GFATM, SAATHII, FOGSI, IAP, API, NACO and Swades Foundation.

 

He has successfully led major national public health programs, such as Elimination of Mother-to-Child Transmission of HIV and Syphilis, National Blind Control Program, Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK), Anaemia Control Programme, and Nutrition Program. His role encompassed program design, budgeting, monitoring, and implementation.

 

Academic Qualification: MPH, DIH, FHM, BAMS, DMLT

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