Our speakers

Prof. Anil D. Sahasrabudhe, Chairman, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE)

Prof. Anil Dattatraya Sahasrabudhe, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Guwahati is currently Chairman of All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE).

Prof. Anil D. Sahasrabudhe has held several important Academic, Research and Administrative positions at Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, Tata Consulting Engineers, North Eastern Regional Institute of Science and Technology (NERIST), Itanagar (Arunachal Pradesh), IIT Guwahati and College of Engineering, Pune (CoEP) prior to joining as AICTE Chairman. As an academician and researcher in NERIST and IIT Guwahati, and as Director, CoEP, he has taken up several new initiatives for Academic, Curricular & Co-curricular activities, Entrepreneurship, Research and Good Governance. He has been an architect of reforms in technical education at AICTE, which include mandatory student induction and internship, faculty certification and ATAL faculty development programs, creating first ever India’s MOOC platform SWAYAM, examination reforms, innovation movement, series of hackathons, Indian knowledge systems, new funding schemes for supporting students, faculty and institutes.

He is Chairman, Basic Scientific Research (BSR), Empowered Committee of UGC & SWAYAM Board. He is a Fellow of ISTE, IET, Institution of Engineers (IE), and INAE.

He has been bestowed with several awards which include "Maha-Intrapreneur Award-2011" of Praj Industries, Jeevan Gaurav Puraskar (Life Time Achievement Award) from MIT World Peace University, Pune in 2019, Mahatma Gandhi Leadership award from Indian Achievers Forum and CSR Times (2019). He has also been conferred Ravi J Matthai National Fellow Award by AIMS (2021).

Prof. Anup Basu, Professor at QUT, Greater Brisbane Area

Prof. GS Bhalla, CEO & founder, Cocoberry

A born entrepreneur, upon graduation from Delhi University, Mr. Bhalla opted to forego studies at a business school and set up his own business venture in 1994—a corporate gifting company. He has always been a pioneer in every business he has started. In 2000 he started one of India’s first KPO company focusing on the healthcare vertical for the US, which has now grown to over a 1000 employees globally.

In 2007 he completed the “Owners Management Program” and “Launching New Ventures” management programs from Harvard Business School. When he thought of entering into the fast growing food-and-beverage industry, he thought of introducing something for the young, health conscious urban Indians and create a brand that is not only associated with health and wellness, but is also a socially and environmentally responsible brand.

Keeping the extreme hot weather in mind, he thought of this cold treat as a viable business option that offered guilt-free indulgence and launched Cocoberry, India’s first frozen yogurt chain. The first store was opened at the posh South Delhi locality of Defense Colony in 2009. There also were a lot of innovations and transformations along the way. Today with its outlets across the NCR, Mumbai, Jaipur, Chandigarh, Pune, Ahmedabad & Goa, Cocoberry is a national brand in less than a span of 2 years with over 30 outlets. Cocoberry will also be opening in international markets very soon.

Cocoberry has received several awards and recognitions in the two short years since it started including “ Top 100 Brands That Rocked India in 2010”(4P magazine), “Top 100 Retailers 2011”(Retailer magazine), “ Most Innovative Concept”(HT City), “ Best Frozen Dessert” (HT City), “Top Rated Frozen Yogurt” (Burrp) to name just a handful.

Mr. Bhalla has also received a number of awards and recognitions such as “Top Young Turk 2010” by CNBC India and has been profiled and featured numerous times in print and TV such as “CNBC”, “India Today”, “WSJ Mint”, “Outlook Business”, “Economic Times”, “Zee Business”, “ Inc.”, “ET Now” and many more.

Professor Anup Basu, International Faculty Fellow & Visiting Scholar, MIT Sloan School of Management

Anup Basu is a professor at the Centre of Behavioural Economics, Society and Technology in Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane. He is an internationally renowned expert in the field of pensions, investments, and behavioural finance. Professor Basu’s research has been published in leading international journals and has made significant impact on public policy and industry practice. His work has been presented in the joint hearing of the United States Government Department of Labor and the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC), cited by the World Bank, IMF policy research report on pension plans, OECD Working Party on Private Pensions, the US Government Accountability Office, the US Senate Hearing before the Special Committee on Aging, and the Australian Government's Review of the Australian Superannuation System.

Professor Basu has been the recipient of several research grants from the government and industry and has been a consultant and advisor to government bodies, regulators, and companies including the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), Queensland Investment Corporation (an investment manager with more than $100 Billion AUM), UniSuper (a pension fund with $70 Billion AUM) and FINSIA, the peak industry body for finance professionals in Australia.

Professor Basu is a regular commentator in media and his work has been covered on numerous occasions by the Financial Times, Pensions and Investments, Australian Financial Review, The Australian, Canadian Business, Gulf News, Business Review Weekly, Sydney Morning Herald, Daily Telegraph, The Age, and The Courier Mail.

Promeet Ghosh, Managing Director, Temasek Holdings Advisors India Pvt. Ltd | @Temasek

Promeet Ghosh joined Temasek in 2012 and is currently Managing Director, India, at Temasek Holdings Advisors India Pvt. Ltd.

Prior to Temasek, Promeet spent 20 years as an investment banker. He was involved as a partner in setting up an entrepreneurial venture to provide M&A and advisory services to mid-sized corporates in India. Promeet was also a Managing Director at DSP Merrill Lynch Limited, the Investment Banking arm of Bank of America in India. During his 18-year stint with DSP Merrill Lynch, he held several senior positions including Head, General Industries Group and Head, Corporate Finance Group. Since 2008, he has also been responsible for senior relationships with large conglomerates.

Promeet holds an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta and a Bachelor of Engineering from Regional Engineering College Trichy, India.

Pulak Kumar Sinha, GM Payment Solutions, SBI Payment Services

Shri Pulak Kumar Sinha was born in a village in Birbhum District of West Bengal. His father is engaged in agricultural activities and mother is a housewife.

After completing his school education from his village school, he completed his B.Sc.(Honours) graduation in Chemistry from Kandi Raj College in Murshidabad District. He is a Certified Associate of Indian Institute of Bankers and has a P.G. Diploma in Management from All India Management Association (AIMA).

He joined State Bank of India as a Probationary Officer in 1981. Since then, he has worked in various capacities as Branch Manager, Regional Manager and Deputy General Manager at different places. His specialised areas are Credit and General Banking. In recognition of his contribution to the organization, Bank had sent him to London for an advanced training.

His present assignment as General Manager (Payment Solutions) is totally related to technology. This is an innovative area and gives lot of scope for betterment in payment space. He enjoys his new role very much. He has been driving an innovative Green Banking initiative from State Bank of India viz. Green Channel Counter and Green Remit Card apart from leading the team of Mobile Banking, Debit Cards and Prepaid Cards. He is presently setting up Bank’s own Aggregator Module. He is also running a pilot on Enterprise Social Networking for the 2.30 lacs employees of the Bank along with another Social Networking portal for customers and SME customers. He is  also driving various other game changing payment related initiatives like Self Service Kiosk, Cash Deposit Machines, Virtual Cards, Business Debit Cards, SME Insta Deposit Cards, Foreign Travel Card, Gift Card, Mobile Wallet, etc.

He was Chairperson of Reserve Bank of India Working Group on Evaluation of Feasibility of Aadhaar based Biometric Authentication as Additional factor of Authentication for card present transactions and related issues.

Pulkit Khurana, Co-founder, Battery Smart

Puncham Mukim, Managing Director,

Puncham Mukim, Puncham Mukim joined Everstone in 2011 and works within the investments team, specialising in investments for the health-care and consumer sectors. Prior to joining Everstone in 2011, Puncham had over four years of experience in financial services including three years in private equity investing.

Earlier, Puncham worked with Warburg Pincus and J.P. Morgan in India. He holds a Bachelor of Management Studies degree from the University of Mumbai, and an MBA from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management. As part of the Everstone investment team, Puncham was actively involved with the Global Hospital investment. In his previous role, Puncham was also part of the team which invested in Metropolis Healthcare.

Puneet Bhatia, Senior Director-Real Estate, ICICI Venture

Puneet Bhatia is Senior Director at ICICI Venture and has 25 years of diversified experience spread across Investment Banking, Private Equity, Lending and Structured Finance in Indian real estate. Prior to joining ICICI Venture he was Director and Head Investments at Mirae Global Investments heading all Real Estate Investment initiatives of the Group in India.
His association with the Real Estate Industry dates back from 1994, the beginning of organized real estate Investment Banking, Consulting and Agency business in India. As one of early stage real estate professional, he played a pivotal role in shaping markets, providing Agency services, working in International Property Consulting organisations and largest private sector Bank as well as pioneering investment in Private Equity/Mezzanine finance (First FDI player to do Mezzanine Finance) . In India, he has been amongst key first set of employee in IPCs like Colliers, JLL, Property Services Group in ICICI Bank, Wells Fargo Bank; having closely witnessed and worked through many economic cycles in India. In the Private Equity/Mezzanine Finance, he has lead team of professionals to invest, manage and successfully exit ~USD 500 million at Wells Fargo and closed a ~USD 250 million office platform with Canada Pension Plan and Investment Board while working at Shapoorji Pallonji Group.
Puneet is also eminent member of RICS (The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors), Chairperson and Member of Global list of Trained Assessors for RICS.

Puneet Chandok, President, AWS India and South Asia (AISPL)

Puneet leads the AWS business in India and South Asia. As the country MD, he leads the entire portfolio of AWS Services, and helps organizations innovate and transform using AWS.

AWS is India's most comprehensive and broadly adopted Cloud platform, we work with customers to help retire their technical debt and drive innovation through our advanced services including Data and Analytics, AI/ML, IoT, etc.

Prior to joining AWS, Puneet held leadership roles with McKinsey & Co. and IBM Global Services. As a Partner at McKinsey, Puneet built and led several practices, digital and technology capabilities across India and Asia.

Puneet holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from the Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta (IIM-C).