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E4SI Fellows
This year's cohort of Fellows is an outstanding group of entrepreneurial and diverse young leaders from across India. We congratulate and welcome them to the network. Their biographies are indicative of their long term commitment to the principle of 'Development through Enterprise'.
Arpit Rungta
Arpit Rungta is a sophomore pursuing a B.tech course in Manufacturing engineering at IIT, Kharagpur and is an alumnus of The Scindia School, Gwalior. He loves quizzing and has represented his school and college in various quiz competitions, including the prestigious ESPN Sports Quiz. He firmly believes that social enterprises alone are the answer to the ever growing woes of the rural population and hopes to contribute his part to their development through his own venture “Unnati”. The venture was adjudged the winner at Eclairez, the Social B-plan competition held during the Global Entrepreneurship Summit 2010 at IIT, Kharagpur. He is enthusiastic about exploring new avenues and has travelled extensively in the rural areas as a delegate at the Asia Pacific Regional Round Square Conference. Currently, Arpit is the secretary of ‘Communique’, a student body at IIT which aims to develop the soft skills of students through interactive workshops. In his free time Arpit likes to play table tennis and read about the trends in world economy and policymaking.
Akash Badave
Akash Badave is a student at BITS-Pilani. He has a deep interest in Sustainable Technology, and wants to catalyze a socio-economic change leading society towards Sustainable Development and harmonious coexistence with the nature. He has led a team of 100 volunteers as the President of Nirmaan, a NPO, and has guided many development projects. Previously, he has interned at ISRO, under Prof Anil Gupta at IIM-A, and has travelled walking 100 km across tribal areas in Gujarat to gain insight in sustainable living. Besides, he is an avid nature lover, a music maniac and a skilled Tabla player.
Aditya Thareja
Aditya Thareja is a final-year student pursuing B. Tech in Mechanical Engineering at IIT Kanpur. Currently he is the Overall Placement Coordinator, Students’ Placement Office; leading a four-tier team of over 100 volunteers. The experience has taught him that for an organization to succeed it is essential that its long term and short term plan are well aligned. He is passionate about social development and believes that for India to continue on its path of development it is imperative for entrepreneurs to enter into the social sector and provide innovative solutions to social problems.
Amola
Amola is an undergrad student of exploration geophysics at IIT Kharagpur. She believes in overall personality development, along with academic excellence which earned her a Scholarship for Higher Education from GoI. Having won prizes in debates, dramatics and quiz competitions at inter college level, she depicted her leadership quality and management skills in organizing Spring Fest. She has channeled her passion for inclusive development through her work in KCG- a student consulting group working in the developmental sector. She desires to solve challenging problems from various walks of life.
Anish Khandelwal
Anish Khandelwal is a third year student of bachelor of technology Mechanical Egineering at National Institute of technology Warangal. He is an active member of National Social Sevices(NSS) in the college. He has undergone training at Essar steel (Surat) and gained practical know how related to mechanical engineering. Anish is interested in working in the field of alternate fuels and combining his knowledge in engineering with leadership and management skill he wants to start a firm which would contribute to solve the problem of the inevitable upcoming energy crisis.
Ankur Dutta
Ankur Dutta is a sophomore at IIT Kharagpur, where he is pursuing B.Tech + M.Tech. in Chemical Engineering. Ankur is very passionate about applied research, his chief interest being alleviating the energy crisis by looking at feasible alternative power sources. He has done a project called Algae for Rural India Development (ARID) based on algal biodiesel and has been a finalist at national events such as theGeneral Electric Edison Challenge-2009 and the Cleantech Challenge-2010. His chief interests include music, athletics,creative writing, quizzing and travelling .
Manu Dixit
Manu Dixit is an undergraduate student at BITS Pilani where he is pursuing a degree in Physics. As member of the Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, BITS Pilani where as a part of Team Conquest, he is actively involved in Networking and acquiring sponsorship to make the event a success. A national level table tennis player, he believes that the next generation of entrepreneurs would have to incorporate greener, sustainable measures in order to answer the demands of our constantly changing society. An avid reader and a travel enthusiast, he embodies a sponge -a willing learner from others’ and his own experiences.
Prateek Bhattsamant
Prateek Bhattsamant is an undergraduate sophomore at IIT Kharagpur, pursuing Manufacturing Science and Engineering. Prateek is passionate about entrepreneurship and his chief interest lies in the socio-economic alleviation of the BoP people, through technology transfer. He is excited about clean technology and his project ‘Algae for Rural India Development’ aims at decentralisation of power production through biodiesel. He has been a finalist at the General Electric Edison Challenge-2009 and the Cleantech Challenge-2010. He enjoys quizzing, blogging and travelling, and loves exploring new ideas.
Raghav Mimani
Raghav is a senior undergraduate pursuing B.E (Hons) in Chemical from BITS Pilani. He is a member of Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership (CEL), SPICMACAY and is also the present General Secretary of the Students’ Union of his college. An adventurer by definition his experiences range from going on a road trip for change as a Grassroutes fellow to coordinating organization of one of India’s largest cultural festival Oasis. An aspiring entrepreneur he deeply values the importance of discussions and can be easily found engrossed into heavy ones on art, politics, business, sports & crazy ideas.
Suraj Dandekar
Suraj Dandekar is a 3rd year student in the department of Industrial Engineering and Management at IIT Kharagpur. He was a member of the Core Organizing Team of Spring Fest – the annual social and cultural fest of IIT Kharagpur in his 2nd and 3rd year. As a result he prefers working with a group of people rather than working alone. He has represented his college in various dramatics and aquatics events. He enjoys travelling, reading and writing poetry. He is interested in working for the improvement of slums in major cities using professional approach.
Swagoto Ghosh
Swagato Ghosh is a final year B.Tech student in mining engineering of IIT Kharagpur. He has done his schooling from Ramakrishna Mission, Narendrapur. He is a huge sports enthusiast. He follows almost all of them and plays a few of them. He is also into quizzing, mainly sports quizzing.He is the dramatics captain of his hall team at his college and also part of the cricket and football hall team. Entrepreneurship really excites him.He along with some batch mates has pioneered a mining engineering technical summit GREATSTEP at IIT Kharagpur which brings together mining companies and academicians on an annual basis. He has certain exposures in working in rural areas through the Rural Development Centre at IIT Kharagpur where he has worked on a project about “Possibility of alternative energy usage in rural areas” under Prof Mahapatro.
He sees his future in the finance sector and looks forward to working with the ‘bottom of the pyramid’ who in his mind are the future drivers of growth in our country.He wants to work either directly in the social sector right from the start if he gets a good opportunity otherwise after working in the corporate sector for a few years wants to come back and start something on his own.
Shruthi Vishwanath
Shruthi is a student at BITS Pilani, Hyderabad Campus pursuing M.Sc. Economics and B.E. Chemical Engineering. She is passionate about classical music and has won prizes for Carnatic music at IITB and BITS-Pilani, among others. She enjoys debating and writing as well, and hopes to set up an organization that brings together musicians to promote peace and learning. Shruthi is the Cultural Representative of BITS-Hyderabad and is an editor of the college magazine. She wants to focus on developmental economics and sustainable engineering as she believes that they show the path to a better world.
Varsha Adusumilli
Varsha is a final year under-graduate student pursuing Information Systems at BITS Pilani Goa Campus. She is interested in just about anything under the sun and believes in trying everything at least once. At college she is the founder member of Career Development Cell which is a forum for campus-industry interaction. This ardent lover of The Beatles has travelled extensively in rural India capturing stories of change and inspiration as a summer fellow of Grassroutes. Believes in the potential of using social media for change, Varsha is the lead organizer of Twestival Global 2010 Goa edition. She is particularly fascinated about identifying business solutions to developmental problems which has been a prime motivation in choosing E4SI fellowship. Up for coffee and random conversations anytime. Stay tuned here.
Varun Srivastava
Varun is a second year undergraduate student of the Dept. of Computer Science and Engineering at Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. His areas of interests include Machine Learning, Formal Verification, Entrepreneurship and Finance.He is excited about the potential of green technologies and would like to work in the Clean Tech sector in the future. He has been a member of Entrepreneurship Cell, IIT Kharagpur and is currently part of a team which is working on making robots play soccer.He enjoys swimming, travelling and reading business biographies in his free time.