Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) Initiative supported by Mentee Profiles updated as on February 2015 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) About the Women on Corporate Boards Programme The WCB initiative is aimed at enhancing corporate governance by improving gender balance and increasing the number of women on boards as independent directors. The Companies Act 2013 prescribes that there should be at least one woman director in a Board, but it may be in the best interest of companies to have more than one woman in the Board and they should be Independent Directors. Academic research has shown that women make very good Board directors and the Boards’ with women directors make better decisions and are more effective. A major impediment in increasing the number of women serving on Corporate Boards in India is the limited number of women who are well qualified and trained to serve on the Boards. An equally big constraint is the limited number of “Board Ready” women who are well known to the Board Chairmen. Without adequate preparation, personal acquaintance or a strong reference, a Board Chairman or a Nomination Committee is unlikely to consider a woman (or man) for a Board position. The WCB Mentoring Programme is designed to deal with both of these issues. This is a structured mentorship programme (by-invitation), wherein Board Chairmen, directors and other senior professionals with extensive experience in Boards and areas of corporate governance mentor and coach qualified high potential women to take up board positions. The programme, inter alia, includes, reading designated study material/ articles, one-on-one sessions on corporate governance with the Mentor, workshops and group discussions on corporate governance and attending Board/ corporate meetings as Invitees. The programme not only prepares women to be placed on corporate boards but also endeavours to ensure that women joining corporate Boards are better prepared to succeed as a corporate Board member. Supported by 3 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) WCB Mentoring Programme 2013 List of Mentees & Mentors Sl. No. Mentee Name Mentor Name 1 Ms. Amita Chebbi Mr. Ashok Jha 2 Ms. Amola Jhaveri Mr. Swaminathan D. 3 Ms. Anita Chaudhary Mr. R. S. Sharma 4 Ms. Anuradha Thakur Mr. Anami Roy 5 Dr. Brinda Jagirdar Mr. M. V. Tanksale 6 Ms. Chandrika Pasricha Mr. Pradip Bhide 7 Ms. Gargi Mashruwala Mr. Hemant Luthra 8 Ms. Geeta Mathur Mr. Jyoti Sagar 9 Ms. Gita Nayyar Mr. Nadir B. Godrej 10 Ms. Hiroo Mirchandani Mr. Harsh Mariwala 11 Ms. Ingrid Srinath Mr. V. Thyagarajan 12 Ms. Jasmine Arora Mr. Aman Mehta 13 Ms. Kalpana Sinha Mr. D. A. Prasanna 14 Ms. Kumud Srinivasan Mr. Rashesh Shah 15 Ms. Maya Dani Mr. Subhash Chandra 16 Ms. Mukeeta Jhaveri Mr. Nihal Kaviratne 17 Ms. Mythili Bhusnurmath Mr. Kapil Kapoor 18 Ms. Mythily Ramesh Mr. G. M. Rao 19 Ms. Nandita Vohra Mr. Deepak Parekh 20 Ms. Neera Saggi Mr. Ravi Kant 21 Ms. Padmaja Nair Mr. Pradeep Bhargava 22 Ms. Pratima Ram Mr. K. V. Kamath Supported by 4 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) WCB Mentoring Programme 2013 List of Mentees & Mentors Sl. No. Mentee Name Mentor Name 23 Ms. Priti Devi Mr. Sanjay Nayar 24 Ms. Priyamvada Balaji Mr. Puneet Bhatia 25 Dr. Punita Kumar Sinha Mr. R. Gopalakrishnan 26 Ms. Punita Lal Dr. Omkar Goswami 27 Ms. Radhika Haribhakti Mr. Arun K. Nanda 28 Dr. Rajani Ved Mr. Saurabh Srivastava 29 Ms. Rinita Singh Mr. Pradip Shah 30 Ms. Ritu Arora Mr. Deepak Bagla 31 Ms. Rumjhum Chatterjee Mr. Sidharth Birla 32 Ms. S.C. Sharada Mr. S. Vaitheeswaran 33 Ms. Sangeeta Pandey Mr. Saroj Poddar 34 Ms. Sangeeta Shankaran Sumesh Mr. V. Balaraman 35 Ms. Sangita Singh Mr. Rajesh Subramaniam 36 Ms. Sarita Nair Mr. Pramod Bhasin 37 Ms. Savita Mahajan Mr. D. Sundaram 38 Ms. Shalini Kamath Mr. Narayan K. Seshadri 39 Ms. Sheela Vadavalli Ms. Ranjana Kumar 40 Ms. Shivpriya Nanda Mr. Hari S. Bhartia 41 Ms. Smita Aggarwal Mr. Ranjit Pandit 42 Ms. Sudha Pillai Mr. M. S. Verma 43 Ms. Sudha Ravi Mr. Uday Khanna 44 Ms. Sutapa Banerjee Mr. Harsh Goenka 45 Ms. Urvashi Saxena Mr. Ravi Kant Supported by 5 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) Amita Chebbi Ms. Amita Chebbi is Head – South Asia, Strategy & Partnerships at the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF). In this role, she provides strategic direction in developing CIFF’s investment portfolio in the region across the health, education and nutrition sectors. She has over 16 years of experience across various management functions in the public and private sectors. Prior to CIFF, she was with the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), where she led programmes in India as Country Director. In this role, she was responsible for evaluating new opportunities, setting up partnerships, fundraising and managing all aspects of operations in the country. She was responsible for building and maintaining strategic relationships with pharmaceutical partners in India and facilitated access to lower prices for pediatric anti- retrovirals (ARVs) to more than 70 countries in the developing world. She has also worked in the commercial banking and credit rating industry. She is a graduate of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Mentor: Mr. Ashok Jha Mentee’s contact details- City: Gurgaon Email: [email protected] Mobile: + 91- 9910 022 553 Supported by 6 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) Amola Jhaveri Ms. Amola Jhaveri is a Career & Educational Counsellor and has established QuadMentor as her entrepreneurial venture. She also provides consulting and counselling support services to the Center for American Education at the Jamnabai Narsee School and the DSB International School in Mumbai. She established the India office of The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and has worked with several UK Universities in an advisory capacity. She has extensive experience counselling students who are exploring options in India and overseas. Ms. Jhaveri began her career with ANZ GrindlaysBank and has worked in Retail and Investment Banking. She has also worked with IL&FS Securities in Institutional Equities with clients in India, UK and the Middle East. Her book “The Study Abroad Handbook” published in 2000 is the definitive guide for Indian students seeking overseas education. She has completed her B.S. in Management Studies and her MBA from the United States. Mentor: Mr. Swaminathan D. Mentee’s contact details- City: Mumbai Email: [email protected] Mobile: + 91 - 9820 072 301 Supported by 7 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) Anita Chaudhary Ms. Anita Chaudhary is a member of the Task Force for signing MOU with Public Undertakings and a member of the Task Force for reviewing the Results Framework Documents (RFD) of the Ministries and the State Governments. She is an IAS of the 1976 batch of Haryana cadre. She has worked in various fields like Finance, Home, Urban Development, Rural Development, Food and Public Distribution and Agriculture Marketing. She retired after more than 36 years in service as Secretary to Government of India in the Department of Land Resources, Ministry of Rural Development, in September 2012. She has also held several other important positions including Special Secretary (Centre-State) and Additional Secretary (Centre-State), Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India; Joint Secretary, Department of Food and Public Distribution, Government of India; Secretary- Institutional Finance, Government of Haryana and Managing Director of Central Cottage Industries Corporation of India. Ms. Chaudhary has a Master’s degree in Social Sciences (Information Technology) from University of Birmingham, UK, and a Master’s degree in English Literature from University of Pune. She is also doing her Ph.D. from IGNOU. The topic of her research is RTI as a tool for good management of Public Distribution System. Mentor: Mr. R. S. Sharma Mentee’s contact details- City: Gurgaon Email: [email protected] Mobile: + 91- 9899 111 169 Supported by 8 Women on Corporate Boards Mentoring Programme 2013-14 (Batch I) Anuradha Thakur Ms. Anuradha Ekanath Thakur started her career as a Probationary Officer, with State Bank of India (SBI) in 1973 and retired in 2007, spanning a career of 34 years. She was the Chief General Manager (CGM), Corporate Accounts Group (CAG), from 2005-2007. She managed diverse business requirements of top 500 customers of the Bank, including Reliance, ADAG, Tata, Larsen & Toubro, Maruti Udyog, arranging their loan syndications, international banking, project financing, and liquidity requirements, coordinating their total banking requirements with other verticals. Prior to that, she was General Manager-Mid Corporate from 2004 to 2005. During her tenure, she started a new business vertical to capture the business of mid-sized regional companies with excellent growth potential. She has an experience of diverse industries including petrochemicals, engineering goods and equipment, non-conventional energy, textiles and pharmaceuticals. As the Deputy General Manager and Chief Financial Officer, Mumbai Circle, she supervised the balance sheet management and statutory audit of the largest circle of SBI covering 667 branches and was responsible for financial planning, forecasting and budgeting for all branches. She also served as Vice-President (VP), Audit and VP, Accounts and Compliance, at the New York office, responsible for complete internal audit function of the New York branches. She was involved in strengthening of systems of regulatory compliance for the entire U.S. operations of the Bank. The US Federal Reserve appreciated the compliance levels and upgraded the Bank’s rating by 2 levels. She has a B.A. (English Literature) from Pune University and C.A.I.I.B. from the Indian Institute of Bankers.