About

Jury

• 

  Lt. Gen. Surendra
  Kulkarni

  Director Mayo College, Ajmer

  Lt. Gen. Surendra Kulkarni (Retd), PVSM, AVSM, VSM**

  Director - Mayo College, Ajmer

  Lieutenant General Surendra Kulkarni has served in the Indian Army for about four decades. He was commissioned into the Armoured Corps in 1975. In recognition of his special contribution, he has been awarded the highest peacetime distinguished service award in the Armed Forces, the Param Vishisht Seva Medal by the President of India

  Parallel to his Army career, he has pursued his academic interests. He is an economics graduate from Fergusson College, Pune. He was a post graduate UGC Merit scholar before he joined the Army. He has four Masters Degrees including an M Phil degree.

  He is an alumnus of Mayo College, Ajmer. Presently, he is the Director since January 2015.

• 

  Prof Yogesh
  Joshi

  Dean International Relations, IIT Kanpur

  Prof Yogesh Joshi

  Pandit Girish & Sushma Rani Pathak Chair Professor and Dean - International Relations, IIT Kanpur

  Prof Joshi is presently Pandit Girish & Sushma Rani Pathak Chair Professor and Dean of International Relations at IIT Kanpur. He completed BE in Polymer Engineering from Pune University in 1996 and PhD in Chemical Engineering from National Chemical Laboratory, Pune, and Indian Institute of Technology Bombay in 2001. Subsequently, he joined Benjamin Levich Institute, New York, where he worked as a Post-Doctoral Fellow for 3 years. In 2004, Prof Joshi joined the Department of Chemical Engineering at IIT Kanpur.

  Prof Joshi’s areas of expertise are Soft Matter, Rheology of Complex Fluids and Polymer Science and Engineering. He is a senior editor of Langmuir and on the editorial advisory boards of Physics of Fluids and Journal of Rheology. Dr Joshi is recipient of many laurels including Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award in Engineering Sciences (2015), Distinguished Teacher Award of Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (2018), Academy excellence award of the Defense Research and Development Organization 2019, and so on. Dr Joshi is an elected fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Sciences, India.

• 

  Prof Manish K
  Thakur

  Dean New Initiatives & External Relations, IIM Calcutta

  Prof Manish K Thakur

  Dean - New Initiatives & External Relations, IIM Calcutta

  Prof Manish Kumar Thakur is currently Dean (New Initiatives and External Relations), and Professor in the Public Policy and Management Group, at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Calcutta. Prof Thakur has been in the academia for more than two decades during which he has published in prestigious professional journals. He is the recipient of Dr. V.K.R.V. Rao Award in Social Sciences (Sociology) (2014), the Indian Sociological Society’s (ISS) Prof. M. N. Srinivas Memorial Award for Young Sociologist (2007), and the Indian Social Science Association’s (ISSA) Prof. Radhakamal Mukerjee Memorial Award for Young Social Scientist, 2002.

  As a faculty member, he has been with IIM Calcutta since 2007. He was also a Fellow at the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla. Prof Thakur is on the Board of IIM Calcutta Innovation Park. He has been the editor of the Jurnal of Human Values (Sage) during 2018-2021. He is an elected member of the Managing Committee of the Indian Sociological Society. He is a member of the Academic Council of Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences (RUAS), Bengaluru, and sits on the Board of Studies of Tezpur University, West Bengal State University, and Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan. He is the nominated UGC Expert on the Advisory Committee for UGC-SAP-DRS-II, School of Social Sciences, SRTM University, Nanded.

• 

  Prof Ambrish
  Dongre

  Faculty Ravi J. Matthai Center for Educational Innovation, IIM Ahmedabad

  Prof Ambrish Dongre

  Faculty - Ravi J. Matthai Center for Educational Innovation, IIM Ahmedabad

  Prof Ambrish Dongre is a faculty member at the Ravi J. Matthai Centre for Educational Innovation (RJMCEI*) at IIM Ahmedabad. Prior to that, Prof Dongre was a Fellow and a Senior Researcher at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi. His research work has focused on the efficacy of various government initiatives at the ground level. His research utilises large datasets and rigorous field work. At IIM Ahmedabad, he regularly teaches courses on Education Policy, Economics of Education, and Quantitative Methods for undertaking research.

  He holds a PhD in Economics from University of California, Santa Cruz (USA) and a Masters in Economics from University of Mumbai.

  *RJMCEI is named after Professor Ravi J. Matthai, the first full-time Director of IIM Ahmedabad. The Centre has a robust research agenda built around innovations in education and innovative approaches to countering problems in education.

  The Centre has a long history of working with the Government of India and various state governments on management in education. It has participated in the assessments of various programs such as the District Primary Education Programme, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, National Literacy Campaigns and Post-Literacy Campaigns, Shiksha Karmi and the Navodaya Vidyalaya scheme.

• 

  Prof Pankaj
  Arora

  Dean Students’ Welfare, University of Delhi

  Prof Pankaj Arora

  Dean - Students’ Welfare, University of Delhi

  Prof Pankaj Arora is currently Dean - Students’ Welfare in the University of Delhi. He has been serving in the Department of Education (CIE), University of Delhi for around twenty-five years. His areas of specialization include Adolescence Education, Democratic Education, Pedagogy of Political Science and Social Science Education. He has eight books to his credit including two edited books on the National Education Policy 2020.

  He has been invited as an eminent speaker to share his views on different aspects of NEP 2020 by various academic institutions including JNU, AMU, BHU, and Jamia Milia Islamia.

  Prof Arora holds several administrative responsibilities including as Director of Institute of Lifelong Learning, University of Delhi, and Member, National Focus Group on Gender Education, NCERT. He is serving various committees at UGC, NCTE, NIOS, ICSSR, SCERT and different Central and State Universities.

  Prof Arora has published more than 19 research articles in indexed/peer reviewed Journals at national and international level. He has made 78 presentations at various conferences and seminars across the world.

• 

  Prof Deepa
  Mani

  Deputy Dean Digital Initiatives and Executive Education, ISB Hyderabad

  Prof Deepa Mani

  Deputy Dean - Digital Initiatives and Executive Education, ISB Hyderabad

  Prof Deepa Mani is a faculty in the Information Systems area and the Deputy Dean for Digital Initiatives and Executive Education at the Indian School of Business. Her research interests are at the intersection of technology, organization and society. She is interested in studying the organization of IT and IT-enabled business functions in firms, and assessment of the business value of a broad class of IT decisions and interventions.

  Prof Mani serves as a Senior Editor at Information Systems Research. Her research articles have been published in leading academic journals and extensively featured in refereed conference proceedings, edited book chapters, and popular media outlets. She works closely with industry to drive innovation and strategies for the digital economy. She also works closely with the central and state governments to explore the impact of technology interventions in areas such as education, healthcare and urbanization.

  Prof Mani completed her undergraduate education at St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi, and her graduate education from Carnegie Mellon University. She received her doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin.

• 

  Prof Monica
  Singhania

  Professor of Finance Faculty of Management Studies, New Delhi

  Dr Monica Singhania

  Professor of Finance – Faculty of Management Studies, New Delhi

  Monica Singhania is Professor of Finance & Accounting at Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), University of Delhi, India. She is a graduate from Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC), post-graduate from Delhi School of Economics (DSE) and a Fellow Member (FCA) of ICAI. She has been awarded Ph.D. in the area of corporate finance and taxation from the University of Delhi.

  Prof Singhania has undertaken post doctoral research at Durham University, UK and Heidelberg University, Germany. She is the author of several books on direct tax laws and several research papers published in leading international journals.

  With over 20 years of teaching and research experience, Prof Singhania has spoken at over 100 national and international conferences, workshops, symposiums, faculty development programmes and corporate training events.

• 

  Parikshit
  Bhardwaj

  GM & Head Content and Strategy, Jagran New Media

  Parikshit Bhardwaj

  GM & Head - Content and Strategy, Jagran New Media

  Parikshit Bhardwaj Heads Content and Strategy at JagranJosh.com. He is an educational content professional with 16+ years of rich experience in creating solutions for new-age learners. He brings transferable skills from diverse industries like Study Abroad, Academic Books and Journals Publishing, eLearning, Test Preparation and online media.

  He has worked in content leadership roles with global brands like The Princeton Review, SAGE Publishing, John Wiley & Sons, and NIIT Limited. He is an avid reader, a content marketing enthusiast and has travelled widely across Europe and America on professional assignments.

  He is deeply passionate about building an ecosystem where the key stakeholders in education - Students, Teachers & Educational Leaders - find a voice on a common platform. At Jagran New Media, Parikshit and team are creating just that with JagranJosh Education Awards.