Ambassador Neelam Deo

Director, Gateway House

A distinguished diplomat, Neelam has been the Indian Ambassador to Denmark and Ivory Coast with concurrent accreditation to several West African countries. She has also served in Indian embassies in Washington D.C., Bangkok and Rome. Her most recent assignment was as Consul General in New York. Her most exciting was liaison with the US congress on strategic issues in Washington DC. Read more.

Manjeet Kripalani

Executive Director, Gateway House

Manjeet Kripalani is the former India Bureau chief of Businessweek magazine. During her extensive career in journalism (BusinessWeek, Worth and Forbes magazines), she has won several awards, including the Gerald Loeb Award, the George Polk Award, Overseas Press Club and Daniel Pearl Awards. Kripalani was the 2006-07 Edward R. Murrow Press Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, New York, which inspired her to found Gateway House. Read more.

Satish Kamat

Member, Executive Board, Gateway House

Satish Kamat is a Chartered Accountant with over thirty years of corporate experience in finance and general management functions. He has been associated with Gateway House from its inception and is a member of its Executive Board. He is with the Mahindra Group since 1999 and previously held senior positions as Director of Cargill India and Corporate Treasurer of Glaxo India.

Akshay Mathur

Head of Research, Geo-economics Fellow

Akshay worked with Fidelity Investments in Boston for over 7 years as a Principal Architect in the Strategy and Architecture group of the multi-billion dollar Institutional and Retail Brokerage division where he was an expert in Research and Strategy Formulation. Read more.

David Brewster

Senior Australia Maritime Fellow

David Brewster is a former corporate lawyer, specialising in complex cross border acquisitions and financing. He is Gateway House Senior Australia Maritime Fellow. He has practised in Sydney, Washington D.C., New York, London and Paris. He completed his doctoral studies in Indian strategic affairs, from the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University, in 2010. He is currently writing a book on India as an Indian Ocean power. Read more.

Luis Miranda

Advisor to Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations

Luis Miranda is an Advisor to Gateway House. He founded IDFC Private Equity and served as the president and CEO from 2002-2010 and as chairman until 2011. Miranda was also a member of the founding team of HDFC Bank and has held various roles in finance, sales and trading at ChrysCapital, HSBC, Citibank, KPMG and Price Waterhouse. Miranda is currently involved with various non-for-profits including Centre for Civil Society, Society for Nutrition, Education and Health Action (SNEHA), Muktangan and Human Rights Watch.

Miranda holds an MBA from the Booth School of Business, University of Chicago, where he till recently co-chaired the global advisory board – Asia. He is also a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI)

K. N. Vaidyanathan

Senior Geoeconomics Fellow, Gateway House

K. N. Vaidyanathan is the Chief Risk Officer at Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. and former Executive Director, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). Prior to this assignment, he was Chief Executive Officer in Alchemy Capital Management Pvt. Ltd. An MBA from the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, Vaidyanathan has held senior positions in MphasiS, Morgan Stanley Asset Management and HSBC. He has held positions on various committees including the SEBI Committee on Guidelines for Investing Abroad and the SEBI Committee on Depository Implementation. He is also a Member of the Finance Board at IIM, Ahmedabad and is Gateway House’s Senior Fellow for Geoeconomics.

Nandini Lakshman

Media Fellow, Gateway House

Nandini Lakshman is a Mumbai-based business journalist and editor and has spent the last three decades chronicling India’s economic ascent in urban and rural landscapes. She has worked at major Indian newspapers like The Economic Times and Business Standard, and international magazines like Asiaweek, Businessweek and Time. She is currently a consultant to the World Bank and is a contributor to the University of Pennsylvania’s online business journal Knowledge@Wharton, and the Hong Kong-based India Business Law Journal. She has a BSc from Mumbai University.

Rajni Bakshi

Senior Gandhi Peace Fellow, Gateway House

Rajni Bakshi is a Mumbai-based author and Gateway House’s Gandhi Peace Fellow. She published a Research paper in October 2012 titled Civilizational Gandhi. Rajni has a BA from George Washington University and an MA from the University of Rajasthan. She is the author of Bazaars, Conversations and Freedom: for a market culture beyond greed and fear (Penguin, 2009), which won two Vodafone-Crossword Awards. Her earlier book, Bapu Kuti: Journeys in Rediscovery of Gandhi (Penguin, 1998) inspired the Hindi film Swades starring Shah Rukh Khan. Read more.

Reshma Patil

Associate Fellow, East Asia Studies, Gateway House

Reshma Patil is Associate Fellow, East Asia Studies, Gateway House and the author of a forthcoming non-fiction book on India-China relations. From 2008-11, she lived and worked in Beijing, heading the first China bureau of the Hindustan Times newspaper. For over a decade, she has extensively reported on current affairs in India for The Indian Express and Hindustan Times, and also written for Mint and Business Today. She is a graduate in political science from Fergusson College, Pune, and holds a postgraduate diploma in print journalism from the Asian College of Journalism in Bangalore. Follow her on Twitter @reshmapatil11

Sifra Lentin

Mumbai History Fellow, Gateway House

Sifra (Samuel) Lentin is a Mumbai-based writer and historian, and the Mumbai History Fellow at Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. She graduated in English from Elphinstone College, Mumbai, and went on to complete her Bachelor’s in General Law (BGL) from the Government Law College, Mumbai. After beginning her journalistic career with Eve’s Weekly and Gentleman’s Magazine, she has since written for a wide spectrum of Bombay-based newspapers and magazines – most notably Mid-Day, The Times of India, The Sunday Observer, Hindustan Times, Taj Magazine, JetWings and One India One People. Read more.

Advait Praturi

Outreach Coordinator and Media Liaison

Advait Praturi is Outreach Coordinator and Media Liaison at Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. Prior to joining Gateway House, he was a client manager and investor relations consultant at a London-based corporate consultancy firm in Mumbai. He has a BA (Hons) in both Political Science and Economics from the University of California, San Diego with a concentration in International Relations. He worked as a Business Development Coordinator in San Diego for an NGO that monitors and evaluates refugee resettlement programs, and has also studied or worked in India, Ghana, Thailand, and Laos.

Alisha Pinto

Research and Operations Coordinator

Alisha Pinto is the Research and Operations Coordinator at Gateway House. She plans, organizes and manages the in-house meetings, monthly seminars, conferences and policy trips. She has a Bachelors in Economics from St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai University and studied International Affairs as an exchange student at Sciences Po in Paris. She has been an assistant editor of the Arthiniti, the annual journal of the Economics Department, St. Xaveier’s. Alisha has also worked with the Ministry of Environment and Forests, the Nature Conservation Foundation, and the Narmada Bachao Andolan.

Azadeh Pourzand

Associate Fellow, Gateway House

Azadeh Pourzand is an Associate Fellow at Gateway House. She has a Masters in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government (HKS) and an MBA from the Nyenrode Business Universiteit. Azadeh focuses on the Middle East and the geopolitics of the region. She was the editor-in-chief of Women’s Policy Journal at Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and has written widely on Iran in publications such as International Herald Tribune, CNN International and the Huffington Post. Born and raised in Iran, Azadeh immigrated to the United States at the age of 16; she has worked and studied in Mexico, Argentina, Bangladesh, China and the Netherlands.

Celine D’Silva

Office Administrator

Celine D’Silva is the Office Administrator and Executive Assistant at Gateway House. Previously, Celine worked at a regional channel called TARA (Television Aimed at Regional Audience) and at Millipore India Ltd, a company that produces filters.

Hari Seshasayee

Web Editor; Researcher, Latin American Studies Programme

Hari Seshasayee manages the website and the weekly newsletter that goes out exclusively to Gateway House members. He also works on establishing Latin America scholarship and engagement. He has a Bachelors degree in Mass Media with a specialization in Journalism from KC College and has worked in Latin America with the national chapter of AIESEC Perú and as a partnership coordinator in Brazil. He also taught Spanish at Language Labs, Chennai, and worked with the Hindustan Times in Mumbai.

Sameer Patil

ASSOCIATE FELLOW, GATEWAY HOUSE

Sameer Patil is an Associate Fellow at Gateway House. His focus area of research is National Security. Previously, he was Assistant Director, National Security Council Secretariat, Prime Minister’s Office, New Delhi. He has also worked at the Indian Indian Pugwash Society, and the M. L. Sondhi Institute of Asia Pacific Affairs. He has written extensively on various facets of Indian foreign and security policy, terrorism, India-Pakistan relations, the Kashmir issue, Sino-India relations, and nuclear proliferation, for various journals and magazines. He holds M.A. and M.Phil. in International Relations from the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

Anirudh Menon

Researcher, Gateway House

Anirudh Menon is a Researcher in the Africa Studies Programme at Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. He completed his Masters degree in International Political Economy from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Prior to Gateway House, Anirudh worked as an Associate with the Indian School of Business and interned with the Global Transaction Services in Citibank, London. He studied Economics during his undergraduate studies at St. Xavier’s college in Mumbai where he was the Editor-in-Chief of Arthniti- a journal of the Economics department.

Asha Rani

Librarian and Information Specialist

Asha Rani is the Information Specialist and Librarian at Gateway House. She is responsible for data collection, archiving, and coordinating the Gateway House library. Prior to this, she was the Reference Librarian at the American Library in Mumbai for 13 years, and taught at Isabella Thoburn College in Lucknow for five years. She holds a Masters in Library and Information Services from the University of Toledo, Ohio.

Nikhil Mani

Communications & Design, Gateway House

Nikhil Mani works on Communications and Design for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. Prior to Gateway House, Nikhil worked and lived in South Africa as Chief Executive Officer of AIESEC in South Africa, working with youth, government, non-corporates and corporates to help bridge the youth skill gap within the country. He spent four years in the organization in various leadership and functional roles. He is a graduate of St. Xaviers College, Mumbai, and has worked in South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana, Austria and Mexico.

Priyanka Nabar

MEETINGS COORDINATOR

Priyanka is the meetings coordinator at Gateway House. She plans and executes meetings with foreign policy experts and scholars, among others. She is concurrently pursuing her Masters in Human Resource Development from JBIMS, University of Mumbai. She speaks French and is an experienced translator and interpreter, with previous accreditations to the French Embassy, and the RPG Group.

Rajeshwari Krishnamurthy

Content Manager

Rajeshwari Krishnamurthy is the Content Manager at Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. She is a journalist by profession, having reported on Tibetan politics for Agence France Presse from Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh and on crime and civic issues for the Hindustan Times in Mumbai. She has also worked withTibet Post International (an initiative of Reporters Without Borders) as a sub-editor, Students for a Free Tibet, Tibet Hope Centre, and at Dharamsala Community Library