India Economic Forum & LITFest 2022

Mohua Mukherjee is Senior Research Fellow at Oxford Institute of Energy Studies. She has worked as a senior development economics professional and team leader for over twenty-five years at the World Bank headquarters in Washington DC. Her most recent work has centred on financial issues related to renewable energy, energy access, distribution utility reform, and energy policy, apart from serving as the Program Manager of a $3 million donor trust fund for India and Nepal on renewable energy. Mohua was responsible for leading the World Bank’s US$1 billion Solar Energy Program in India. She served as India Energy Head, looking after both the solar program as well as the distribution utility reform program, as well as the Green Energy Corridor construction (of new extra high voltage transmission lines to evacuate solar energy from remote, large utility scale solar parks). Mohua led all the World Bank’s energy policy dialogue with the Government of India from mid-2014 to end-2016.

Ajay Chhibber is Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the Institute of International Economic Policy, George Washington University, and Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. He was Distinguished Visiting Professor at the National Institute for Public Finance and Policy and India’s first Director General of Independent Evaluation with the status of Minister of State in 2013-14. From 2008-2013 he was UN Assistant Secretary-General, Assistant Administrator at UNDP. He served as the World Bank’s Country Director in Turkey and Vietnam and led the 1997 World Development Report on the role of the state. He has published five books on economic development and many articles in international journals and in major newspapers. He has a PhD from Stanford University, a master’s degree from the Delhi School of Economics, and has done advanced management programs at Harvard University and at INSEAD, France. He has also taught economics at Georgetown University and the University of Delhi. He won the David Rajaram Prize as best all-rounder at St. Stephens College, New Delhi.

Salman Anees Soz is an economic development consultant, author and commentator. He has extensive experience across a range of economic development issues in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Middle East and North Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. He serves as a consultant to multiple World Bank teams and was previously a consultant at the Asian Development Bank. He is a recipient of the World Bank President’s Award for Excellence. His commentaries appear in a avriety of media outlets. He also speaks on politics, economics and international affairs at universities, think tanks and conferences. He is Deputy Chairman of the All India Professionals’ Congress and serves as an advisor to other institutions. He holds a master’s degree in business administration from Yale University, a master’s degree in economics from Northeastern University, and a BA (Hons.) in economics from St. Stephen’s College, where he was the president of the Students’ Union Society.

Ajit Ranade is Vice Chancellor at Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics. He earlier served as an Executive President & Chief Economist, Aditya Birla Group and Executive Officer of Financial Technologies India Ltd. and Chief Economist at ABN AMRO Bank. His professional career has spanned academic and corporate assignments, including teaching in universities in India and U.S. Dr. Ranade serves as a Director on the Board of Hindalco Almex Aerospace Limited, a joint venture company of Hindalco and Almex Inc. of USA. He has served on various committees of the Reserve Bank of India, most recently in the committee for Fuller Capital Account Convertibility.

Dr Sekhar Bonu (PhD & Post Doctorate) joined as the Director General of Development Monitoring and Evaluation Office (DMEO) in April 2019. DMEO was established by the Government in September, 2015 as an attached office of the NITI Aayog to fulfill the monitoring and evaluation mandates assigned to NITI Aayog. Before joining NITI Aayog, Dr. Bonu worked with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in Manila for 15 years. At ADB he worked in health, urban infrastructure development and regional cooperation, mainly in South Asia region. Dr. Bonu worked in the Indian Administrative Services and served as a civil servant in the state of Rajasthan between 1987-2003, among others, as district magistrate, director of primary and secondary education, chief executive officer of state-owned enterprises. Dr. Sekhar Bonu has a Ph.D from the Johns Hopkins University and is a Chartered Financial Analyst charter holder. He has wide range of research and operational interests and has published in peer-review journals
 

Puja Mehra is a senior economic journalist with a career spanning over seventeen years. She covers key contemporary Indian economic developments. She has recently authored the book ‘The Lost Decade (2008-2018): How India’s Growth Story Devolved into Growth without a Story’. She won the prestigious Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award in 2008 and 2009 for her stories