Dr. Shama Bhat completed his doctoral thesis from the Department of Biochemistry, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore in 1979. His thesis work was on the regulation of Cholesterol Biosynthesis. After completion of the Ph. D., he moved to the Department of Microbiology, University of Connecticut Health Centre, Farmington, USA, where he worked on the regulation of Myelin synthesis. Here, his discovery on the requirement of non-oligodendrocyte signals for the development of myelin was published in several international journals. In 1983 he joined the faculty of the department of Neurology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA, where he continued to work on the regulation of myelin synthesis, which is the main factor in the problems associated with Multiple Sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the human brain. At this time the AIDS related complications were started to become a major issue. Dr. Bhat noticed that the later stages of AIDS related dementia and the Multiple Sclerosis related dementia are similar and started to work on the AIDS related projects. At this time, it was shown that the HIV virus enters the white blood cells through CD4 receptor, and the brain cells do not have CD4 receptors. Dr. Bhat and his associates have shown that Galactosyl ceramide, a specific lipid molecule in the myelin and oligodendrocyte, mediates the entry of HIV into the brain cells. This major discovery was published in Science and several other journals.

In 1994, Dr. Bhat decided to come back to India and with the help of a few NRI friends, set up Bhat Biotech India (P) Ltd. The mission was to set up a company to provide quality healthcare products at affordable price and serve the people and provide employment. He chose Diagnostic kits and reagents and Biotech products as the means to achieve the goal. In 1996 the first product, Pregnancy test, was launched and thereafter more than 100 products were added to the portfolio. They include HIV, Hepatitis, Malaria, Chikungunya, Cancer markers, Dengue, cardiac markers, syphilis, etc. Started with only five people, Bhat Biotech today employs more than 350 people directly and more than 300 people indirectly. When the Covid pandemic spread all over the world, Bhat Biotech was at the forefront in providing diagnostic kits and reagents for Covid. Dr. Bhat derives immense pleasure in providing employment to so many people. Bhat has assembled a good team of scientists for the innovation on Biotech and diagnostic fronts. The R&D team now has developed more than 80 products and going very strong with more and more innovative products. The Chikungunya test is the first one in the world. We will be the first one to launch the snake venom rapid test, test for the detection of silkworm parasite and Haemophilia rapid test kits shortly.

Production of antigens in animals and E. coli cells are used for the production of kits for the detection of HIV, Malaria, Syphilis, etc. We have a group devoted to the development of monoclonal antibodies, FBA fragments and humanized antibodies. We also have initiated work on humanization of antibodies for eventual therapeutic applications as well as in the production of HVR fragments of antibodies in diagnosis.

We have a group that works on building instrumentation. We have built a PCR machine completely indigenously for the first time in India.

As a social concern, Dr. Bhat has set up a Navachethana Retirement Township in Puttur, DK, exclusively for the retired people. This houses more than 120 families and provides all the services required for elderly people.

In addition to the products, Dr. Bhat has realised the need for hands on training for the Biotech students and started training programs for Biotech students. Bhat Biotech is the approved training centre for DBT. Many students from the Biotech collages and Engineering collages attend the training programs. Several students are registered with Manipal University for Ph.D. through Bhat Biotech. Bhat Biotech is an approved centre by Manipal University for Ph. D.

Vivek Wadhwa is an academic, entrepreneur, and author of five best-selling books: From Incremental to Exponential; Your Happiness Was Hacked; The Driver in the Driverless Car; Innovating Women; and The Immigrant Exodus.

He has been a globally syndicated columnist for The Washington Post and has held appointments as Distinguished Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program, Carnegie Mellon University, and Emory University; adjunct professor at Carnegie Mellon and Duke University; fellow at Stanford Law School and UC Berkeley; and head of faculty at Singularity University.

Vivek is based in Silicon Valley and researches, speaks, and writes about advancing technologies that are transforming our world. These advances – in fields such as robotics, artificial intelligence, computing, synthetic biology, 3D printing, medicine, and nanomaterials – are making it possible for small teams to do what was once possible only for governments and large corporations to do: solve the grand challenges in education, water, food, shelter, health, and security.

Shanti Mohan is the founder of LetsVenture and trica - a global marketplace that enhances transparency and access for private market investors, helping over 700 companies raise close to 200M in funding. The platform has investors from 60 countries, including HNI's, family offices and institutions. A second-time entrepreneur, Shanti previously built an embedded systems startup in the early 2000s. She actively contributes to ecosystem development through policy work at state and central levels. She is also an active angel investor having invested in over 50+ startups.

Beyond her business ventures, Mohan founded MyPragati, a non-profit focused on education and employment in a village in Darjeeling.

Prof. K.L. Krishna ardently pursued his teaching and research interests in the fields of Applied Econometrics, Industrial Economics, Economics of Productivity and Regional Inequality and Empirics of Trade. Prof. Krishna has edited/co-edited five books, of which Econometric Applications in India (1997) is still used by all those econometricians engaged in model building to study the major fields of economics. As a teacher of Economics at the Delhi School of Economics, he taught Econometrics and Industrial Economics for over six decades which made him so dear to the student fraternity. He has guided 24 Ph.D. scholars and 20 MPhil students.

Amitabh Kant is presently India’s G20 Sherpa.

He is a governance reformer and a public policy change agent for India, having driven key reforms and initiatives during his tenure as the Chief Executive Officer of the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) (2016-2022) and the Secretary of the Department for Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) (2014-2016), Government of India. He has been a key driver of flagship national initiatives such as Startup India, Make in India, Incredible India, Kerala: God’s Own Country and the Aspirational Districts Program. These initiatives have repositioned India and Kerala and have widely been recognized as transformational.

The National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) is India’s apex policy-making institution, with the Prime Minister as its Chairman. As CEO of NITI Aayog, Kant has driven a vast range of national-level developmental and policy initiatives which catalyzed India’s social and economic development and have brought about a paradigm shift in policy-making.

As Secretary, DIPP Kant has driven the Start-up India movement which has led to India emerging as the third-best ecosystem for startups globally, with over 70,000+ start ups and over 110+ Unicorns. His focus has been to facilitate Ease of Doing Business (EoDB) through predictability, consistency of policies and elimination of rules, regulations and procedures. This led to India jumping 79 positions in Ease of Doing Business Indicators. He also initiated competition and ranking amongst Indian states based on their EoDB indicators. The competition and ranking has led to a transformational impact on States.

Books

Amitabh Kant is the author of the following books:-

• Made in India
• Branding India-An Incredible Story
• Incredible India 2.0
• Editor of “The Path Ahead- Transformative Ideas for India”.
• He is the author of over 500 published articles in leading Indian newspapers.

Recognitions

• Economic Times Policy Change Agent of the Year Award
• Bloomberg TV Personality of the year Award
• NDTV Administrator of the year Award
• Distinguished Fellowship of the Institute of Directors.
• He is the recipient of One Globe Award-2016 for leadership in Transforming Governance for the 21st Century.
• He is also the recipient of Sir Edmund Hillary Fellowship awarded by the Prime Minister of New Zealand.
• India Today's High & Mighty rankings of 2019 featured Kant as one of the most powerful people in India under the category of "The Supercrats - India's Top Bureaucrats".

Education

Amitabh Kant did his schooling from Modern School, Delhi, graduation in Economics (Hons) from St. Stephens, Delhi University and M.A from Jawaharlal Nehru University. He is a Chevening Scholar. He has also undertaken a mid-term course with John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University and Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad.

Prof. Govindan Rangarajan obtained an Integrated MSc (Hons) degree from the Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, and a PhD from the University of Maryland, College Park, USA. He then worked at the Lawrence Berkeley Lab, University of California, Berkeley, before returning to India in 1992. He has been a faculty member of the Department of Mathematics, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), since 1992. He is currently the Director of IISc.

Prof. Rangarajan’s research interests include nonlinear dynamics and chaos and time series analysis. He is a JC Bose National Fellow. He is also a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Sciences, India. He was awarded the Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Academiques (Knight of the Order of Academic Palms) by the Government of France. He was also a Homi Bhabha Fellow.

As co-PI of the Indo-French Cyber University Project, he helped establish the first inter-continental satellite-based courses. These courses were taught live to Indian and French students in various subject areas. He also headed the National Mathematics Initiative, which ran instructional schools and workshops in cutting-edge areas at the interface between mathematics and other fields. He was instrumental in setting up and running the interdisciplinary PhD programme in mathematical sciences. He also headed the Indo-US Virtual Institute for Mathematics and Statistical Sciences, which was jointly set up by the National Science Foundation, USA and the Indo-US Science and Technology Forum, India. He is currently the Director of the Indo-French Centre for Applied Mathematics (IFCAM), the first Unités Mixtes Internationales of CNRS, France in India. This is a joint venture between the Department of Science and Technology (DST), India, and a consortium of French institutions. IFCAM supports joint research projects between India and France in the broad area of applied mathematics.

Prof. Rangarajan has also served as the Chair, Department of Mathematics and Convener, Digital Information Services Centre from 2002 to 2008. He was the Chair, International Relations Cell (now called the Office of International Relations) from 2008 to 2014. Most recently, he was the Chair of the Division of Interdisciplinary Research (comprising 10 departments and centres) from 2014-2020. He also headed IISc’s fundraising and alumni outreach efforts in his role as the Chair, Office of Development and Alumni Affairs from 2015-2020.