Press Release

Preya Pal
Head: Research and MEL

Preya is a Process design specialist with over three decades of experience in large global companies. Her expertise is in leading high impact initiatives from design to implementation with a focus on simplification, user experience and digital.

She has worked on diverse portfolios including Product design, Divestiture and integration, Quality, Customer experience, Knowledge management, Business Process transformation and Delivery Strategy at leadership positions. As a Six Sigma Black Belt, Lean practitioner and Service Excellence facilitator, she enjoys working with teams using data and analytics to design intuitive, intelligent processes and systems. She lends her expertise in solving problems both in development and private sector.At GAME, Preya will be leading the Measurement, Research and Evaluation function.

Raja Perumal
Head: Human Resources

Armed with rich experience of over 22 years across varied industries with demonstrated expertise in strategic 360 degree view of people functions, Raja calls himself a partner in developing the leadership capital of the company. From managing his own venture to managing people functions across various industries including deep sciences, IT, consumer goods, his adventurous journey continues to explore new boundaries keeping a deep focus on understanding people, their aspirations, behavior and their leadership potential. He leads the People Strategy function at GAME.

Some of the areas he has extensive experience in are 1) Design & Curation of Personal, Team and Organization transformation programs for leaders for themselves & for their units 2) Exposure and appreciation of businesses across and geographies including HR for Life sciences, personal computing, Enterprise products, Infrastructure Services, Software Development, Consulting and Total Outsourcing across the globe. 3) Adept in partnering with a globally diversified leadership and managing a versatile workforce including P&L leaders, Client engagement managers, High end domain consultants, R&D specialists, Sales field force, Delivery heads 4) Hands on experience in Client engagement scenarios including Acquisitions, JV and people transition across the globe. 5) Appreciation of Compensation & benefits, Design and implementation of Variable programs, costing and budgeting. 6) Sales force assessment, design and execution of leadership development programs. 7) Leading and providing thought leadership to a large group of HR professionals.

Ajay Parikh
Chief Program Officer 

Ajay has more than two decades of leadership experience in Digital, Manufacturing, and Information Technology with a domestic and international footprint in the conceptualisation, start-up, and stabilisation of new Businesses / Business lines. He has deep expertise in strategy, high-worth program management, talent management, optimisation, consulting, product design, production, supply chain, and ecosystem design. His experience is varied, having worked with Wipro, Synise Technologies, and India Heritage Foundation to scale up the Akshaya Patra initiative.

At GAME, Ajay will oversee the Program Delivery to ensure the successful implementation of GAME 2.0 program objectives. He will drive the four key work streams viz Women Entrepreneurship, NRLM project, NBFCA initiative and Youth Entrepreneurship. He will provide the leadership to forge the necessary partnerships, review financial commitments and institute a partnership governance mechanism. He will drive execution strongly to deliver on commitments that GAME has made for all the important projects across the work streams.

He holds an Electrical Engineering degree from L D College of Engineering, Gujarat.

Sanjana Govindan
Vice President, Women Entrepreneurship

Sanjana leads Women Entrepreneurship at GAME, driving ideation, innovation, and implementation of interventions that create and unlock pathways for women entrepreneurs to grow, thrive, and flourish. Innovation, Imagination & Insight are her ‘go-to’ tools, to solve complex problems at scale. She brings her background in Innovation at the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) to all aspects of her work- always looking for ways to create 10X impact. She is particularly focused on supporting and enabling people coming from backgrounds of poverty, vulnerability, and marginalization and over the past decade worked directly with over 50 nonprofits solving challenges in this segment.

In the past, she has worked extensively on the philanthropic side of the social sector, and her last role was as General Manager Social Venture partners. She is excited about working with funders who are keen to unpack complex challenges and place big bets on the future. She is passionate about her role as guide and steward of these vital resources, working hard to ensure meaningful impact for all involved.

Sanjana is a board member for Association of People with Disabilities. She is co-founder of India’s only cloud animal rescue network, and a published children’s book writer. Sanjana is an avid sportsman and continues to play badminton and shoot 10m rifle competitively.

Sanjana holds a master’s degree in public policy from the National University of Singapore, where she was an LKY Scholar. When not working, she loves to spend time with her daughter and dogs. She adores gardening and beekeeping. Sanjana is very keen to collaborate, co-create and support entrepreneurs and ‘payitforward’ is her currency of choice.

Radha Radhakrishnan
Vice President -Marketing & Communications

Radha Radhakrishnan leads Marketing & Communications at GAME. She is a marketing and communication professional with over 30 years of experience in IT, Healthcare, Consumer, Manufacturing, Political and Social sectors across India and International markets.

She has been a journalist, advertising professional, corporate & marketing communications, and political communications professional and has a formidable reputation for driving integrated marketing and communications campaigns. She has worked at Wipro Limited, Wipro Enterprises, Azim Premji Foundation, The Hindu Business Line & Indiainfo.com, to name a few. She is also the founder of Mrigashira, a dedicated podcast for communications professionals in India. It was one of the first dedicated podcasts for communication professionals in India. (www.mrigashirapodcast.com).

She has been a regular columnist on communications and a visiting Faculty for premier media and communication institutes in India.

Gurudutt Ashwath
Vice President, Finance and Compliance

Gurudutt is responsible for setting up the Finance and Compliance infrastructure for GAME and for complying with all statutory, regulatory and reporting requirements of all funders and other stakeholders. He is also responsible for setting up specific outcomes & deliverables for all activities being undertaken by the teams in driving impact and achieve the objectives set up in the GAME charter.

Gurudutt has 30+ years of experience at top MNC’s in managing teams, aligning objectives, creating plans, assigning tasks, reviewing progress including Reporting and Compliances.

Mekin Maheshwari
Co-Founder

Mekin is a co-founder of GAME. He is extremely passionate about discovering & unleashing human potential and entrepreneurship. He started Udhyam Learning Foundation which works on developing entrepreneurial mindsets amongst youth from various backgrounds.

He was one of the early employees at Flipkart where he played various roles – he was Head of Engineering and built out a great tech team, which he counts as his biggest professional achievement, before running 2 small startups within Flipkart and finally took on the role of Chief People Officer. He left Flipkart in March 2016. He started his career with Yahoo! and then went on to join Ugenie where he created weRead, a successful social network around books. Mekin completed his B.E. from PESIT Bangalore in 2002.

Mekin is equally passionate about learning, human potential and technology. He is a doting father, a forgetful husband and an obedient son. He loves sports and has recently developed a taste for yoga and meditation as well as experimenting with his diet.

Ravi Venkatesan
Founder

Ravi Venkatesan is the founder of the Global Alliance for Mass Entrepreneurship (GAME) and UNICEF’s Special Representative for Young People and Innovation

Ravi is a former Chairman of the Bank of Baroda where he oversaw the turnaround of India’s second largest public sector bank. As a board member then Co-Chairman of Infosys Ltd., he helped steer the company through a challenging set of transitions. Prior to this, as Chairman of Microsoft India, Ravi helped build India into Microsoft’s second-largest presence in the world. He was instrumental in creating Microsoft India’s Project Shiksha, a computer literacy program which has so far trained over 40 million school children in India. He was previously the Chairman of Cummins India and led its transformation into India’s leading provider of engines and power generation solutions. He also helped establish the Cummins College of Engineering, India’s first engineering college for women, in Pune.

Ravi is the founder of Social Venture Partners India, a pan-India network of philanthropists and is a partner at impact investor Unitus Ventures.

Ravi has a BTech from IIT Bombay, an MS from Purdue University, and an MBA from Harvard Business School where he was a Baker Scholar. He is the author of an acclaimed book “Conquering the Chaos: Win in India, Win Everywhere” published by Harvard Business Review.

Madan Padaki
Co-Founder

Madan is an entrepreneur working at the intersection of transforming youth, enabling entrepreneurial journeys & empowering social changemakers. His vision is that every youth is an empowered youth, every empowered youth is an entrepreneur & job-creator and every entrepreneur is a social changemaker!

An engineer from NIE Mysore and an MBA from SPJIMR, Mumbai, Madan has worked with Wipro, Infosys and Mphasis (Japan) – before being bitten by the entrepreneurial bug in 2000 when he co-founded MeritTrac as a pioneering idea in skills assessments. In 2011, he moved to Manipal Education to head up Strategy, Innovation and International Partnerships, and transitioned out in March 2013 – listening to his heart to embark on a journey as a changemaker.

With a vision of transforming rural youth to be entrepreneurs, he founded 1Bridge, a platform that empowers rural entrepreneurs to accelerate abundance of access, choice & convenience to rural citizens by leveraging technology. He is also the Managing Trustee of Head Held High Foundation, a non-profit that stands for human dignity. He is the co-founder of Global Alliance for Mass Entrepreneurship (GAME), a network that aims to catalyse large-scale job creation by bringing together Government, Businesses & Civil Society organisations to work collaboratively on igniting a mass entrepreneurship movement

Partnering with other education leaders, Madan is also a Co-Founder & Director of Sylvant Advisors. He currently serves as a Strategy Advisor to UNICEF India and is helping to launch a large initiative on youth empowerment called Generation Unlimited, in India. He is a member of the FICCI National Committee on Rural Development, member of the CII National Committee on Women Empowerment, member of Governing Council of TiE Bangalore and Advisory Board Member of Youth for Seva . He had also served as a Senior Advisor to Tata Trusts between 2015-2016. A Bangalorean by birth & heart, he resides in the heart of the city – Basavanagudi with his wife & two children.