Leadership

Kannan is the president of the governing board. He is specifically interested in enhancing education, agriculture, and the livelihood of farmers and under privileged.

Kannan retired as the additional chief secretary to government of Tamil Nadu and he served as an officer of the Indian administrative services for nearly 4 decades both in the central and state services.

He served as the secretary to the government of Tamil Nadu in several prominent administrative departments such as agriculture, higher education, tourism, and cultural and religious endowments. His track record also includes remediating the health of several public sector units and cooperatives such as INCOSERVE and TANSI. As the commissioner of agriculture, he successfully handled the 2002-2004 draught.

He is also a distinguished academic. He has published several books and referred conference/journal articles on topics such as agriculture, management, cooperation, participatory rural appraisal, history, astrology, museology, etc.

Jayaraman is the founding trustee and currently serving as the managing trustee. He is the Member Secretary of the governing board. He frames the overall organization direction and strategy for fostering the entrepreneurship culture and enhancing the employability of youth.

Jayaraman is a distinguished academic. Previously, he served as the senior professor and chairperson of the school of business studies in Madurai Kamaraj University (MKU). He retired from MKU after 4 decades of exemplary service as a professor and administrator. He created the first master’s program with dual specialization in information technology and management. Jayaraman was also responsible for making entrepreneurship a compulsory subject in all management degrees. He has graduated 35 Ph.D. students with thesis topics specializing in entrepreneurship. He also held several administrative responsibilities during his tenure. He was the nominee of the governor of Tamil Nadu to the syndicate that governs MKU from 1994-1997. He also served as the special officer of MKU before retiring.

Jayaraman was instrumental in building the track record of center for entrepreneurship development (CED) in the last 3 decades. His leadership led to several training, research, and consultancy assignments for fostering entrepreneurship and enhancing employability that were funded by state and central governments, and international organizations such as ILO, USAID, FNF, CIDA, etc. that aggregate to a total 50 crore rupees in grants. His leadership also led to the establishment of information technology incubator at a cost of 100 lakhs which was received as grant from both state and central government.

Jayaraman also served on the boards of several organizations. He was the member of the steering committee on education and sports of the Tamil Nadu state planning commission for the XII five-year plan period (2012 – 17). He was nominated as a member of the life insurance corporation (LIC), southern zone advisory board, during the period 2009-13. He is the co-chairman of the federation of entrepreneurship development institutions (FEDI) in India. He also served as an independent director of Tamil Nadu tourism development corporation (TTDC).

Murthy is a member of the governing board. With his knowledge and experience in education and training the under-privileged sections of the society, he advises the CED Team on the innovative strategies for serving the under-privileged.

Previously, Murthy retired from the Indian civil service after 4 decades of service with the Tamil Nadu government. He served as the personal secretary to the honorable chief minister (Late) Dr. M. G. Ramachandran.

He has also served as secretary of several prominent administrative departments of Tamil Nadu governments. During his tenure as a district collector of several major districts, he led several welfare programs for promoting adult education, public hygiene, and upliftment of the marginalized and differently sections of the society.

He is a recipient of several awards and honors from the chief minister and the governor of Tamil Nadu for his meritorious administrative services.

Sharma is a member of the governing board. He advises the board on entrepreneurship promotion programs targeting micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSME).

Sharma has over five decades of experience in international business, small and medium enterprises, administration, and logistics. Previously, he was the executive director of national small industries corporation (NSIC). During his tenure at NSIC, he was a staunch advocate for promoting MSMEs.

He conducted several international cooperation programs for MSMEs both in India and abroad. In addition, he was the advocate of MSMEs from India in several United Nations (UN) forums.

After retiring from NSIC, he also served as the director of maharishi university of management (MUM), at Noida.

Murali is a trustee and member of the governing board. He advises the board on education and training programs.

Murali is world renowned expert on entrepreneurship education and training. His work has led to several national and international publications.

He was a founding faculty member of entrepreneurship development institute of India (EDII).

He served as the project directory of the UNIDO sponsored inter-regional center for entrepreneurship and investment training. He also founded and led an institute for helping family-owned businesses in Saudi Arabia from 2004-2006.

Raju is a trustee and a member of the governing board. He helps frame our objectives for enhancing the employability of youth, and our strategy for adopting digital education.

Raju is the chief executive officer of Coempt Eduteck Pvt. Ltd. Raju has over two decades of experience in providing technology solutions in education sector. He has helped develop end-end examination evaluation systems that are being adopted by several universities and school education boards. This solution has revolutionized public examinations by making evaluation objective and preventing any malpractice.

He has also helped develop online learning systems that are being adopted by several universities and educational institutions for enhancing the employability of students.

Raju also serves on the boards of several educational institutions.

Karthick is a trustee and member of the governing board. He helps frame our strategy for adopting digital education.

Karthick is a principal software engineer at Microsoft, Redmond, USA. He is an expert in developing secure, dependable, and trustworthy computer systems. At Microsoft, he leads developing services to assure the reliability and safety of the Microsoft Azure datacenter network.

His work has led to several US patents and refereed publications in top-tier conferences and journals.

He is also passionate about teaching. During his graduate study at Syracuse University, his work as a teaching assistant for graduate and undergraduate courses led to two outstanding teaching assistant awards.

Hemalakshmi is a trustee and member of the governing board. She helps frame our strategy for welfare programs related to women and digital education.

Hemalakshmi has rich work experience in software development, project management, business system analysis, requirement gathering, software design, implementation, and documentation.

She pursued two professional master programs in the United States – information science at Ball state university, and computer engineering at Syracuse University. Her research work at ball state led to a recognition award.

She is passionate about women welfare and digital education.

Srinivasan is a trustee and member of the governing board. He helps frame our objectives for addressing public health care issue.

Srinivasan is a consultant gastroenterologist at GEM hospitals, Chennai. He specializes in minimally invasive GI surgery, hepato-pancreato-biliary surgery, GI cancer surgery, and abdominal multi-organ transplant surgery. Srinivasan is an accomplished academic.

His work has led to several US patents and refereed publications in top-tier conferences and journals.

He has won several academic honors such as gold medal in undergraduate degree and Braun award for outstanding achievement in postgraduate training at Stanley medical college. His clinical research has led to several refereed publications in international conferences.

Sukumaran is a member of the governing board. He provides guidance on capacity building and startup village entrepreneurship program (SVEP).

Sukumaran is an expert in entrepreneurship motivation, training, capacity building, and industrial and artisanal cluster development.

Previously, he served as a faculty in the entrepreneurship development institute of India (EDII) for 30 years. He also served as the head of EDII’s branch in Kerala. During his tenure in EDII, he conducted 50 faculty development programs.

He also helped Kerala government with their flagship poverty alleviation program called Kudumbashree and formulated programs for startups.