Rural Livelihoods

RURAL LIVELIHOOD

Agriculture

RURAL LIVELIHOODS

Agriculture

India being a primarily agrarian society, engages 54.6% of its workforce in agriculture allied activities for their livelihood. The key issues the farmers in India face are the climatic conditions, visibility and product enhancement, low productivity of farming, limited participation in the input and the output market and erratic water resources. To combat these issues TNS India Foundation has developed a program to help the sustainable livelihoods of local farming households which aims to help their economic development by sustainably improving household incomes. To do so, the program focuses five key aspects:

  • Improving the yield and quality of crops by promoting  good agricultural practices which includes training on pre and post management of crops, using natural and chemical pesticides and the benefits of these on soil quality, training farmers with more efficient ways to harvest yields, benefits of quality grading and sorting produce for better prices and methods of identifying when crops have reached maturity.

  • Strengthening farmer institutions is a crucial aspect of the program which is aimed at helping agricultural households (farmers) come together to establish Farmer Producer Companies (FPC) in order to eliminate middlemen who buy from individual households and sell to institutional buyer,  get better prices for raw material purchases, get access to loans, to sell directly larger markets (domestic & international) and be able to sell to institutional buyers for better prices.

  • Developing market systems by helping the FPC gain access to institutional buyers, promoting FPC as a one-stop solution to farmers by providing agri-inputs such as pesticides and overall help support in produce making, with higher yields and better quality crops.

  • Promotion of organic kitchen gardens by providing training on establishing organic kitchen gardens, educating farmers on the benefits such as monetary benefits of growing their own vegetables and the importance of good nutrition on long-term health.

  • Building local capacities to manage critical water resources sustainably by promoting good natural resource management practices by rejuvenation and creation of water structures (recharge shafts and distilling), the formation of water user committees to make farmers aware about the importance of local water resources and conducting resource mapping in each area.

Rural Entrepreneurship 

Rural Entrepreneurship 

India is set to become the third largest economy by 2031, entrepreneurship has become a critical driver of national economies given transformations in the global economy, technological advancements, novel innovations and changing demographics (Rao & Kalyani, 2017). Indian Entrepreneurship will prove to be a catalyst of social change in the country, innovation, and job and capital generation and overall economic progress- making entrepreneurship critical for poverty alleviation, sustained personal and national growth, enhancement of living standards and overall well-being of society. Although small and medium enterprises (SMEs) globally tend to face similar challenges to growth, women-led businesses face significant additional structural and cultural barriers to gender.Due to cultural and structural barriers, especially faced by rural women entrepreneurs, they are often unable to access the assistance they require to become more credit-worthy, more viable suppliers for corporate buyers and create more sustainable businesses. It is reported that only 30% of rural women are engaged in economic activity. As a result, rural women entrepreneurs lack the skills, exposure, awareness and knowledge required to grow their businesses To address the issues faced by rural women entrepreneurs, TNS India Foundation has developed a comprehensive mentoring program to push women to break social and cultural  barriers and polish their entrepreneurial skills to establish and grow their own businesses. This program has three main components:

  • Providing skill training and assistance to help women entrepreneurs grow and sustain their SGBs. Training curriculum will include aspects of personal financial literacy training (e.g. managing household finances, utilizing personal financial services effectively, etc.), farming as a Business (developed in-house based on adult learning principles and derived from learning from our past rural-agri entrepreneurship programs)  and handheld support to develop business plans for women-led businesses.

  • Strengthen SGBEs access to markets and services by working closely with the management of existing women-led SGBss to increase the organization’s female membership base as well as to enhance women’s role in the organization’s leadership, develop women SBGleaders’ ability, alongside male leaders, to manage business operational functions, develop partnerships with financial institutions to improve the women –led SGBs’ access to commercial finance to support growth, developing banking and online skills in beneficiaries and providing training and helping gain access to digital sales platform and entry-level mobile device in order to use apps like WhatsApp, Facebook (Marketplace), Google (Pay), Youtube, and Paytm among others.

  • Increase access to financing for women entrepreneurs by providing support in quantifying their financing needs and improve creditworthiness based on results from a comprehensive cost and investment analysis and creditworthiness assessment for the program SGBs, organizing documentation, loan application, and support to persuasively sell their creditworthiness  and through working with existing SGBs to increase women’s access to market inputs, valuable services and financing.

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302, Wellington Business Park 2, Andheri - Kurla Rd, Andheri  East, Mumbai, Maharashtra 400069. 

info@tnsif.org

022- 28501625

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Carefully crafted by Ekahal

Reshma Bhatkar

Director - Finance, Legal & Compliances

Reshma is responsible for TNS India Foundation’s financial and grants management portfolios. She also looks after secretarial and audit matters. She has over 25 years of experience in Donor Agency (International and Corporate) & Implementing NGO sectors, with 11 years of senior management experience in development organizations.

Before TNSIF, Reshma headed Finance and Operations at Educo, a Spanish Donor Agency and has worked with organizations like Catholic Relief Services, a U.S. based Donor Agency and the ICICI Foundation for Inclusive Growth as Grants Manager.

She holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Business Management from Wellingkar’s Institute of Management Studies and an MBA-Finance from Pondicherry University.

Charulata Sippy

Financial Services
Charulata is a Senior Consultant in the Financial services sector. She is currently associated with Sicomoro Advisors Pvt Ltd, a SEBI registered Investment Advisor. She served on the board of BoFA Securities Ltd as an Independent Director from June 2016 to June 2022. In her role as an independent director, she was also a member of the company’s Audit Committee, Nomination and Remuneration Committee (NRC) and the Corporate Social Responsibility Committee (CSR).

Prior to her role as Independent Director, Charulata has a work experience of 21 years in the industry. She was the Head of Global Market Operations, India at DSP Merrill Lynch Ltd. She was also appointed the India Representative for the Diversity and Inclusion initiatives in 2007 and was on the Regional Diversity and Inclusion Council in Bank of America Group companies.

Kartik Kini

Chief Operating Officer, Waterfield Advisory
Kartik holds the positions of Chief Operating Officer, Brand Custodian, and Chief of Staff at Waterfield Advisors. His tenure is marked by a profound commitment to operational innovation, process optimization, and the strategic enhancement of policies and technologies.  

His tenure of over seven years at Waterfield is characterized by visionary leadership and strategic initiatives that have catalysed growth for the firm. Kartik expertly leads diverse teams across numerous domains including Finance, Human Resources, Marketing, Compliance, Legal, Operations, Technology, Customer Service and Administration

Geetanjali Jha Chakraborty

President, Apnalaya

Geetanjali Jha Chakraborty has a diverse background, with early years in the corporate sector and over two decades in the Development Sector. She has held leadership and CEO-level roles in organizations such as Concern India Foundation, CHILDLINE India Foundation, and ARMMAN.

Currently, she serves on the boards of Apnalaya and Vihaan, and she is also on the Global advisory board of Tech Care for All and Missing Links trust.

Geetanjali is passionate about child protection, urban inequality, and folk arts. She holds a Master’s degree in Social Work and an LLM in Human Rights and Criminal Law.

Pramod Singh

Head-Legal and Compliance, DSP Investment

Pramod is a legal and compliance professional with 4 decades of experience. A qualified lawyer who worked at SEBI as Deputy General Counsel, he was instrumental in framing regulations for various intermediaries. He has spent a considerable amount of time at large MNCs- Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, and Credit Suisse, and has handled compliance for not just India but also South Asia.

Currently, he works with DSP investments and is in charge of the legal and compliance matters for the Family Office of Mr. Hemendra Kothari

Vijayalakshmi Srinivasan

Founder and CEO, Peoplescape
Vijayalakshmi is the Founder & CEO of Peoplescape Consulting, an Executive Coaching and HR Consulting company. She is an alumnus of The Tata Institute of Social Sciences and The School of Coaching, London. She has a total of 22 years of corporate experience of which, the last 11 years was at Merrill Lynch as Senior Vice President and Head of Human Resources. She founded Peoplescape in 2012 after her 22-year stint across various organisations. Vijayalakshmi’s areas of expertise includes Coaching, Human resources strategy, change management, leadership training etc which is offered equally to established corporates, start-ups and the Social Sector.

Padma Parthasarathy

Senior Vice President,
Tech Mahindra

Padma is a Senior Vice President at Tech Mahindra. She has played various roles at Tech Mahindra, over a sixteen-year period, notable among them being her role in leading the post-acquisition activities after Tech Mahindra acquired Satyam. Most recently, she has been engaged in initiatives related to her personal passions of Sustainability and Social Change, as well Diversity and Equity. She earlier led the digital business and the global consulting teams at Tech Mahindra. She’s been featured on Forbes India’s W-Power 2020 list of self-made women leaders and in the list of Top 75 Women in STEAM by the Government of India in 2022. 

Padma is on the Board of the MaDeIT Innovation Foundation promoted by the Indian Institute of Technology, Design and Manufacturing (IIITDM), Chennai. She is on the Advisory Board of the Centre for Digital Transformation, IIM Udaipur. She is also on the Governing Council of the Centre for Digital Transformation set up by CII to promote digital transformation in Indian businesses.

Rupa Bohra

Managing Director


Rupa currently serves as the Managing Director at TNS India Foundation.

Through her role, Rupa provides strategic guidance, design and implementation leadership to unlock the economic potential of India’s most vulnerable.

Under her diligence, the team has grown to 200+ individuals across more than 18 locations in the country. She has built and developed partnerships with corporates such as Accenture, Capgemini, HDFC Bank, HDB Financial, Moody’s, IDFC Asset Management Company, Lenovo, Motorola, and foundations such as the BlackRock Foundation, Lenovo Foundation, Reliance Foundation and Pernod Ricard India Foundation.

As a well-connected member of the development community, Rupa represents TNS India Foundation’s interest in economic transformation. She has over 21 years of experience across the financial services, technology, banking and development sectors and has managed multi-locations across India and the Asia-Pacific region.

Before TNSIF, Rupa headed corporate partnerships at Magic Bus India Foundation. She has also held leadership positions at organisations such as JP Morgan and Bank of America-Merrill Lynch.

 

Shaminder Kour

Associate Director - Curriculum & Training Quality

Shaminder leads the Curriculum and Training Quality practice at TNS India Foundation.

She has 21 years of experience in corporate training, learning and development, and eLearning.

She is an IBM alumni and has consulted with several Fortune 500 companies including HP, Accenture, Oracle, Capgemini, and Unisys over the years.

Roshan Shetye

Lead - Human Resource

Roshan comes with 15+ years of experience in Human Resources, primarily in social sector in different thematic areas like education, woman empowerment, anti-human trafficking. Roshan holds a postgraduate degree from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management studies and is a trained personal counselor. Roshan is also trained in human behavior analysis through ISABS and various other workshops. She is a certified member for POSH law and has been on the panel of various organizations. She hailed from corporate, heading the HR Banca channel with Aviva Life Insurance and eventually entered the social sector and has worked with organizations such as Dasra, Educate Girls, Justice and Care, Samhita, Sol’s ARC and Consulted with Piramal Foundation, Masoom, Antarang Foundation to name a few.

Frida Dias

Associate Director - Human Resources & Administration
Frida Dias, Associate Director of Human Resources & Administration at TNS India Foundation, has had a rich professional journey of over 22 years. Her expertise lies in leading HR processes and driving strategic people management initiatives. She is a proponent of fostering an inclusive culture of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion within the organization.

In her leadership role, Frida is committed to continuous improvement, focusing on engagement, welfare activities, and devolving HR responsibilities to line managers. Her strategic approach aims at maximizing productivity and building leadership capabilities. Frida’s leadership is marked by her excellent analytical skills, team building skills, and interpersonal abilities, which inspire trust and cohesion across all stakeholders.

With a professional background that includes roles at MPS Ltd, Tata Interactive Systems, and Pride India, Frida now heads the HR and Administration department at TNS India Foundation. In this capacity, she oversees overall HR operations, employee life cycle management, and HR strategy. Frida holds a post-graduate degree in Extension Education from SNDT University, Mumbai.

Deepak Kamble

Associate Director – Programs

Deepak Kamble serves as the Associate Director – Programs at TNS India Foundation. With over 18 years of experience spanning both corporate and development sectors, Deepak brings a wealth of expertise in Corporate Social Responsibility, NGO Management, Program Management, Operations, Business Development, and Strategy.

In his role, Deepak oversees the Financial Careers programs, demonstrating his commitment to empowering youth and children to reach their full potential. He has led programs across multiple states of India in leadership roles and has collaborated extensively with international teams in the development sector. Furthermore, his background includes valuable experience in education and ed-tech organizations, where he contributed significantly to business development initiatives.

Deepak holds an M.Sc. from the National University of Singapore (NUS), with his thesis work conducted at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), Germany. Additionally, he is a graduate of Pune University, having earned an MBA degree.

Driven by a passion for people and team development, Deepak focuses on designing and implementing processes to effectively execute projects, thereby ensuring the delivery of impactful outcomes.

Hitungshu Debnath


Chief Business Officer
Sundaram Alternate Assets Ltd.
Hitungshu is a working professional in the BFSI segment with over 2.5 decades of experience. He is a Chevening Scholar from London School of Economics and CFP from Financial Planning Board of India. He also holds a Masters’s degree in Marketing Management. He has been associated with major brands, in senior management positions, like HDFC AMC, TATA MF, Motilal Oswal, Angel Broking, Arthayantra to name a few.

Currently, he is a part of a new management team at Sundaram Alternate Assets Ltd. Prior, he was the Director & COO of the Karvy Group. Hitungshu is also passionate about CSR and has a Masters in CSR and Ethical Management from the University of Applied Sciences, Vienna, Austria. Post the same, he ventured out to do a start-up in CSR consulting along with his mentor and Chairman of ISO 26000, Mr. Martin Neurieter, in Europe.