Board of Directors

Ramesh Srinavasan, President

Ramesh serves as President of Akanksha Education Fund’s Board of Directors and brings a clear focus and vision to this leadership role. In addition, Ramesh also serves on the board of the Akanksha Foundation in an advisory capacity, connecting the two distinct but mission-aligned organizations enabling them to work closely together. He currently lives in New York and is a Director at McKinsey and Company. Ramesh and his wife Charuta Joshi are deeply invested in improving access to education and the quality of education in India and are strong advocates for Akanksha bringing individuals and corporations to the Akanksha family in the U.S. and in India. Ramesh and Charuta personally support Akanksha’s work as Ambassadors.

Bharti Malkani, Vice President

Bharti believes in the transformative power of education and has been an Akanksha supporter for many years drawn by its impressive track record of educating underprivileged children and championing systemic education reform in her native India. She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and began her career as a professional in the field of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications representing small-cap, publicly-traded technology companies to Wall Street investors. Bharti is a serial entrepreneur having established and managed small businesses in disparate industries. She supports other entrepreneurs as an angel investor in several women-led start-ups and through private equity investments. Additionally, Bharti is a NYC licensed real estate salesperson and advisor with Manhattan Boutique Real Estate.

Fally Malkani, Treasurer

Fally has been a supporter of Akanksha for many years, believing in the opportunity of education . She graduated with a degree in Economics and Accounting from the University of Bombay and then went on to complete a two-year course in Design and Typography from the London College of Communication.

Kate Shoemaker, Secretary

Kate is currently the VP of Public Policy and University Partnerships Strategy for Braven, a non-profit that focuses on the college to career transition for first-generation and low-income college students. She has also served as Chief Operating Officer at the South Ward Children’s Alliance in Newark, and led public policy and special projects for Geoffrey Canada at the Harlem Children’s Zone (HCZ) for 16 years. A highlight of her tenure at the HCZ, was advising the Obama Administration and others on the federal Promise Neighborhoods program, which was inspired by HCZ. Kate and her husband Anand live in Irvine, CA with their two children.

Amir Mirza

Amir is the CFO of Datalot since 2018 and has
served as the CFO of an ed-tech startup before then. Prior to his CFO role, he spent almost two decades as an investment banker at Bank of America Merrill Lynch advising technology, media, and telecom clients on M&A and financing. Amir completed his post-graduate studies in management at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, and received his MBA from the Anderson School at UCLA. He lives in New York with his wife Anitha and two children. Anitha and Amir strongly support Akanksha’s mission of changing children’s lives through a great education.

Kavitha Eechambadi, Young Professionals representative

Kavitha has been serving on the Akanksha
Education Fund Young Professionals Board for almost 3 years and is inspired by Akanksha’s mission to improve access to education for underserved children in India. She participates as a mentor in Akanksha’s Alumni Program and is also focused on planning fundraising and awareness events this year for the YP Board. Kavitha currently works in New York City at Flatiron Health, where she builds and manages strategic partnerships with biopharmaceutical
companies to advance cancer research.

Lorie Broser

Lorie is active in several children’s non-profit
initiatives as she believes in the life-changing potential of education and early intervention. She serves on the Leadership Council for the
Mindich Child Health & Development Institute
at The Mount Sinai School of Medicine and is on the Board of Trustees at the Stephen
Gaynor School, a New York City independent K-8 school for children with learning
differences. For the last 16 years she has also served on the Executive Board of the Genetic Disease Foundation, which focuses on research, education, and the prevention of genetic disorders. Prior to her board work, Lorie spent two decades creating large-scale marketing campaigns for brands including General Motors, National Geographic, Kraft Foods, Disney, NASCAR, and Scholastic. Lorie earned a B.A. in Communications from the University of Michigan and a Culinary Arts Degree from the Natural Gourmet Institute.
She lives in New York City with her husband and two children.

Medha Vedaprakash

Medha Vedaprakash is the Director of Core Ads Product Partnerships at Facebook. Prior to that he was Head of Global News partnerships at Google. Previously, Medha worked at the private equity firm, McAndrews & Forbes where she advised portfolio companies on their digital transformation and innovation strategies. During her career, she was a venture capitalist for several years and held several board positions at high growth technology startups. She is a passionate supporter of women entrepreneurs and is an angel investor in several women-founded and led companies. Medha is a deep believer in the power of education to change lives and that drives her support of Akanksha’s work.

Nathalie Joseph

Nathalie’s philanthropic mission is to break the cycle of poverty through education. She was introduced to Akanksha in 2014 and has been a supporter since then. Nathalie and her daughters volunteered at an Akanksha school in 2015. After helping teachers in the classroom, sitting through parent meetings and visiting student homes with social workers, Nathalie is a firm believer in Akanksha’s approach in educating kids and entire communities. Nathalie and her family are based in the San Francisco Bay area.

Nymrata Advani

Nymrata Advani earned her B.A from Mount Holyoke College and her MBA from Columbia University and London Business School, and spent 12 years at Citigroup in Strategy and M&A. She currently invests in women-led startups through 37 Angels and other women-focused investor networks, and serves as an advisor to companies in the Building and Real Estate sector. She has served on the Board of various India-focused non-profits such as the Pure Water Project and has been involved with Akanksha since 2016. Having grown up in Mumbai, Nymrata is passionate about effecting change to the plight of women and children in India. She lives in New York City, with her husband Yunus and children, Anysa and Arman.

Ruyintan (Ron) Mehta

Ron is a 1970 alumni of Indian Institute of Technology Bombay with a Bachelors degree in Chemical Engineering. He received advanced engineering degrees in Chemical Engineering and Engineering Administration from University of Connecticut and University of Utah respectively.

Ron is now fully retired and is passionate in giving back to several educational and social
causes in India. Mehta was the immediate Past President of IIT Bombay Heritage Foundation and currently serves as President of IIT Gandhinagar Foundation. He is the Executive Director of Wheels India Niswarth (WIN) Foundation – a non profit that works in the field of Water & Sanitation and Maternal & Child Health issues in India. Mehta is also a Board Member and Co-Chair of Water with an NGO called Wheels Global Foundation founded by alumni of IITs in the US to provide technology based philanthropic solutions in Water (W), Health (H), Education (E), Energy (E), Livelihoods (L) and Sustainability (S) in India.

Sachin Jindal

Sachin is a partner at Tower Research Capital, a leading quantitative trading company in the financial markets. He runs an algorithmic trading desk at Tower that trades global equities using machine learning based models. Sachin is an alumnus of IIT Delhi and Columbia University. Education has had a transformative impact on his own life and he firmly believes in the power of education to harness the potential of an individual. Sachin and his family are based in New Jersey.

Shankar Iyer

Shankar is CEO of Viteos Fund Services and an entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience in building businesses with a global influence in the outsourcing industry. He founded Viteos in 2003, and his leadership led the company to become an international enterprise. Prior to Viteos, he served as President and CEO of Silverline Technologies.

Srividya “Vidya” Prakash

Vidya is CEO of Antara International, working to catalyze the delivery of public health solutions to improve maternal and child health outcomes. She previously worked in management consulting and public health with McKinsey & Company and with their Global Public Health Practice, and in commercial asset management in renewable energy with sPower-AES. Vidya is based in the San Francisco Bay Area where she is an active volunteer in the areas of education, domestic violence, gender equity, homelessness and food security, including with Maitri, Dining for Women, Abode Services and local food banks.

Sarah Roberts, Board Member Emeritus

Sarah lived in Bombay/Mumbai from late 1985 to 1989. Having met Shaheen Mistri in the early 1980s, she and several friends of India began The Akanksha Fund Inc. in 1997, to support Shaheen’s work with after school education in India. Focused on the mission of providing readiness and entry of the youngest of the underserved into the educational system, Akanksha gradually grew to creating charter-like schools in cooperation with the municipal school authorities of Maharashtra. At this point, the US based Fund changed its name to The Akanksha Education Fund.