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Leadership

LEADERSHIP
The WFP Trust for India operates as a non-profit entity committed to supporting the country to achieve its targets under SDG 2: Zero Hunger. We hold the belief that access to nutritious food is a fundamental human entitlement, essential for maintaining an active and wholesome lifestyle. Our leadership cadre is resolute in its pursuit of realizing this objective and contributing positively to the lives of millions across the nation.

The Beginning

 

Former Prime Minister of India, late Mr. IK Gujral launched the WFP Trust for India and served as its first chairperson. The Trust continues to follow the path laid down by him for a hunger-free India as it seeks to be a catalyst in making this vision a reality.

Board of Trustees
Dedication. Expertise. Passion.
The WFP Trust for India has a history of high-profile trustees.

Chairperson

Rita Sarin

Rita Sarin was most recently the Global Vice President & Country Director of The Hunger Project in India and leads a nationwide alliance of more than 40 organisations implementing strategies to empower women in local democracy.

She has committed her life to igniting and sustaining the leadership spirit of elected women at the grassroots level in India.

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Managing Trustee

Vrinda Sarup

Vrinda Sarup, IAS, (Retd) has over two decades of experience in development and social change. Her work is strongly focused on the education sector involving school development, vocational and higher/technical education, and skill development.

Ms Vrinda Sarup was Secretary, Food and Public Distribution in the Government of India before her retirement.

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Trustee

Neela Gangadharan

Neela Gangadharan has held senior positions in policymaking and program implementation with the Kerala Government and the Government of India.

She has held positions including Chief Secretary, Home Secretary and Agricultural Production Commissioner, and Secretary to Government of India and Minister (Agriculture) in the Embassy of India, Rome.

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Trustee

Som Mittal

Mr. Mittal is the former Chairman and President of NASSCOM (2008 to 2014), a premier trade body for the IT-BPO Industry in India. With more than three decades of experience in the IT and automotive sector, Som Mittal is a seasoned Indian business executive, and has played a key role to enable industry to realize its strategic vision of ‘Transform Business and Transform India’. He is based out of New Delhi.

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Trustee

Sanjay Kaul

A development policy analyst, corporate leader, and a former IAS officer, Sanjay Kaul has over four decades of rich and professional experience in both the government and the private sectors.

He worked in the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) for 28 years before taking early retirement in 2007. During his long tenure as a civil servant, Kaul worked at leadership positions across sectors – development, health, nutrition, education, child development, food and agriculture, and industry.

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Trustee

Siraj Hussain

Mr. Siraj Hussain joined the IAS in 1979 and was allotted Uttar Pradesh Cadre.  He served the State Government of Uttar Pradesh in various capacities, including District Magistrate, Managing Director of UP State Industrial Development Corporation, UP State Agro Industries Corporation, and Registrar of co-operative Societies. He was also posted as Secretary, Education, Panchayati Raj and Secretary to Chief Minister.

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Trustee

Amb. Anil Wadhwa

Ambassador Anil Wadhwa is the Former Secretary (East) Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India and Ambassador of India to Italy. He was a member of the Indian Foreign Service (IFS) from July 1979 till May 2017. He is based out of New Delhi.

In his 37-year career with the IFS, he has been Ambassador of India to Italy & San Marino, Thailand, Oman, Poland & Lithuania.

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Advisor Emeritus

Prof. M.S. Swaminathan

Padma Vibhushan Professor M S Swaminathan has been acclaimed by TIME magazine as one of the twenty most influential Asians of the 20th century and one of the only three from India, the other two being Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore. He has been described by the United Nations Environment Programme as “the Father of Economic Ecology” because of his leadership of the green revolution movement in agriculture and by Javier Perez de Cuellar…

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Rita Sarin

Rita Sarin was most recently the Global Vice President & Country Director of The Hunger Project in India and leads a nationwide alliance of more than 40 organisations implementing strategies to empower women in local democracy. She has committed her life to igniting and sustaining the leadership spirit of elected women at the grassroots level in India.

Ms Sarin has had many successes channelling bilateral and multi-lateral partnerships and funding to strengthen the voice of grassroots women in local government and in society at large. In addition, she has successfully garnered the support of various government officials at all levels to broaden the scope of women’s role in local democracy as well as bridge the gap between the marginalised, poor and their government.

Prior to joining The Hunger Project, Ms Sarin served as a National Program Advisor for the Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA), in India.

Ms Sarin also represents many international and national Boards which include Girls Not Brides UK, ActionAid India, PRIA, and Mobile Creches and plays a crucial role in working on issues of governance, strategies and partnerships.

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Vrinda Sarup

Vrinda Sarup, IAS, (Retd) has over two decades of experience in development and social change. Her work is strongly focused on the education sector involving school development, vocational and higher/technical education, and skill development.

Ms Vrinda Sarup was Secretary, Food and Public Distribution in the Government of India before her retirement. She was instrumental in implementing India’s Right to Food Act and digitising food distribution processes for the poor and vulnerable sections of society.

As a bureaucrat for over 35 years, Ms Vrinda Sarup has crafted two major pan-India school education programmes, District Primary Education Programme (started in 1993-94) and the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan (rolled out in 2003-04). The two programmes are credited with changing the face of primary and elementary school education in India.

She has also been instrumental in reorienting and redesigning vocational education in secondary/senior secondary schools in 2014 by making them more industry and employment oriented.

Ms Vrinda Sarup has also held the post of Secretary and Principal Secretary in the Finance Department of the Uttar Pradesh government, India’s largest and most populous state.

Ms Vrinda Sarup has also worked closely with international development agencies, including the World Bank, DFID of the UK, UNICEF, the European Union and the World Food Programme.

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Neela Gangadharan

Neela Gangadharan has held senior positions in policymaking and program implementation with the Kerala Government and the Government of India. She has held positions including Chief Secretary, Home Secretary and Agricultural Production Commissioner, and Secretary to Government of India and Minister (Agriculture) in the Embassy of India, Rome.

Ms. Neela Gangadharan has represented India as the Alternate Permanent Representative (APR) in the UN agencies in Rome and was an active Member in all their Governing Bodies including the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Council, Executive Board of International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and Executive Board of the World Food Programme (WFP), the FAO Finance Committee and Audit Committee of IFAD. She also served in the FAO’s headquarters in Rome as Chief Agricultural Policy Support for five years dealing with Agricultural Policy Support to developing countries.

As Secretary, Women & Child Development Ministry, Government of India, Ms. Neela Gangadharan was involved in the revamping of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) program which is possibly the largest government-led nutrition programme in the world. Post-retirement, she established and served as the first Chairperson of the Kerala State Commission for Protection of Child Rights.

While working in the UN, Ms. Neela Gangadharan coordinated and contributed to various policy studies and policy support programmes which included a project for the Farmers Commission of India on integrating agricultural markets in India. She also led the team from FAO for sector review and formulation of a Draft Agriculture Policy in the aftermath of civil war in Liberia and led a Norwegian funding programme on food security in seven developing countries. She is currently Member of the Administrative Reforms Commission of Kerala.

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Som Mittal

Mr. Mittal is the former Chairman and President of NASSCOM (2008 to 2014), a premier trade body for the IT-BPO Industry in India. With more than three decades of experience in the IT and automotive sector, Som Mittal is a seasoned Indian business executive, and has played a key role to enable industry to realize its strategic vision of ‘Transform Business and Transform India’. He is based out of New Delhi.

A Distinguished Alumni from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and a master’s in business administration from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, Mr Mittal’s early career included Larsen & Toubro, Escorts and Denso. Other key positions since then include Chief Executive of Wipro’s PC Server and Services Division, MD of Digital Equipment India Ltd, MD of Digital GlobalSoft (an HP subsidiary); and Senior Vice President, Asia Pacific and Japan, at HP.

Having led a trade association, he is an effective influencer and public policy advocate. He has been a member of the Indian Prime Minister’s Committee on National e-Governance, a member of Boards of several corporate and academic institutions. He is also associated as Chairman/ member of several not for profit organisations addressing disability, livelihood amongst others.

In recognition for his contributions, he has received several citations and awards.

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Sanjay Kaul

A development policy analyst, corporate leader, and a former IAS officer, Sanjay Kaul has over four decades of rich and professional experience in both the government and the private sectors. He worked in the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) for 28 years before taking early retirement in 2007. During his long tenure as a civil servant, Kaul worked at leadership positions across sectors – development, health, nutrition, education, child development, food and agriculture, and industry.

Following his voluntary retirement from the IAS in 2007, Kaul joined NCDEX and set up the NCDEX Institute for Commodity Markets and Research (NICR), where he continued as a Director till May 2021. Thereafter, Kaul led National Collateral Management Services Limited (NCML),  a leading agri-business company as Managing Director and CEO and later as Company Chairman from June 2008 to August 2021.

Kaul is presently chairperson of the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) Task Force set up by the Government of India. Kaul is an Independent Director at SEWA GRIH RIN Ltd. (SGRL), an affordable housing finance company. Kaul is a Trustee of the Karnataka Health Promotion Trust (KHPT). He also serves on the Managing Committee of several DPS schools.

Sanjay Kaul is an active CII National Council of Agriculture member and a regular speaker at industry conferences organised by CII, FICCI, and ASSOCHAM. Kaul has served as a part-time Director and Member of several leading corporations and organisations, including the Bombay Chamber of Commerce and FICCI Agricultural Committees and Independent Director, Capri Global Financial Services, Director, Food Corporation of India (FCI), and Director, National Warehousing Corporation.

During his long tenure in the IAS, Kaul led challenging assignments across development and social sectors, including working in the Prime Minister’s Office and serving in various capacities in the Karnataka Government – Chairman Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board,  Commissioner, Secretary (School Education), Secretary (Medical Education), Commissioner, Schools, Commissioner, Health,  Additional Director,  Industries, Joint Director, Food, and District Magistrate at Bangalore and Tumkur. His last assignment with the government was as Joint Secretary, Government of India, where he headed the Food Policy and FCI division.

Kaul works actively with Mobile Creches, a leading child-rights NGO, on which he has served as its chairperson (2014-17) and on its Governing Council for over ten years. He also supports other NGOs such as Doosra Dashak and the Rainbow Foundation.

A post-graduate in Economics from the Delhi School of Economics, Kaul began his career as a college lecturer in Economics at the University of Delhi and has retained his interest in academics and writing. Kaul has published extensively on food and nutrition, education, health, and poverty-related issues and made presentations at national and international seminars.   Since 2009 Kaul has served as Editor of “India Commodity Yearbook,” the country’s benchmark annual reference book in the commodity space, in which he has contributed several papers. He was a Member of the Core Group that brought out the “State of the Young Child in India” [Routledge, 2020]. Kaul writes regularly for finance and economic dailies. He has just completed the manuscript for his book, “An Alternative Development Agenda for India”, which is being published by Routledge, the reputed UK publishing house.

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Siraj Hussain

Mr. Siraj Hussain joined the IAS in 1979 and was allotted Uttar Pradesh Cadre.  He served the State Government of Uttar Pradesh in various capacities, including District Magistrate, Managing Director of UP State Industrial Development Corporation, UP State Agro Industries Corporation, and Registrar of co-operative Societies. He was also posted as Secretary, Education, Panchayati Raj and Secretary to Chief Minister.

In the Union Government, he has worked as Joint Secretary, Department of Food and Public Distribution; Chairman-cum-Managing Director of Food Corporation of India and Secretary Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR).

He served as Secretary to Government of India in the Ministry of Food Processing and Ministry of Agriculture.

Several new schemes of Modi 1.0 Government (including PM Crop Insurance Scheme, e-National Agricultural Market and Price Stabilisation Fund etc.) were formulated under his supervision.

In 2016, he was awarded Doctorate in Philosophy (honoris causa) by Acharya NG Ranga Agricultural University, Andhra Pradesh in recognition of his contributions for advancement of Agriculture.

After superannuation from the IAS, he was Visiting Senior Fellow ICRIER till April 2022.

He has written about 280 opinion pieces in several reputed publications including Bloomberg Quint, Business Today, Business World, DNA, Down to Earth, Economic Times, Financial Express, Hindu Business Line, Indian Express, India Cable, Mint, Newsclick, Tribune, Money Control, Rajasthan Patrika, and the Wire. He has a regular monthly column in the Print.

He is the Chairman of Board of Directors of National e-Repository Limited, a subsidiary of NCDEX. Mr Hussain is also an advisor to FICCI for Food Processing Sector.

In October 2021, he promoted Arcus Policy Research Private Limited with Shweta Saini, an economist. The company is engaged in policy research in agriculture and allied sectors.

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Amb. Anil Wadhwa

Ambassador Anil Wadhwa is the Former Secretary (East) Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India and Ambassador of India to Italy. He was a member of the Indian Foreign Service (IFS) from July 1979 till May 2017. He is based out of New Delhi.

In his 37-year career with the IFS, he has been Ambassador of India to Italy & San Marino, Thailand, Oman, Poland & Lithuania. He has also served in Hongkong and Beijing (twice), as the permanent mission of India in Geneva and worked on deputation with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in The Hague, where he headed their media and public affairs and government relations branches.

Ambassador Wadhwa was head of the East Europe division in the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi and looked after relations with Russia and Eastern European countries. As Secretary (east) in the Ministry of External Affairs he oversaw relations with ASEAN, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific, the GCC, Middle East and West Asia. Amb Wadhwa has served as India’s Permanent Representative to Bangkok based ESCAP, and to the Rome based Agriculture Agencies FAO, IFAD and WFP. He served as Chairman of the WFP Board in 2016-17.

Ambassador Wadhwa has contributed several articles on foreign policy, disarmament and international security. He is fluent in Chinese and knows French. His wife Ambassador Deepa Gopalan Wadhwa has also been the Indian ambassador to Japan, Qatar, Sweden, and Latvia. He was Senior Fellow, VIF from Jan 2018 to Oct 2018.

Currently, he is a Distinguished Fellow with the Vivekananda International Foundation in New Delhi and serves on a diverse range of Corporate Boards as an Independent Director.

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Prof. M.S. Swaminathan

Padma Vibhushan Professor M S Swaminathan has been acclaimed by TIME magazine as one of the twenty most influential Asians of the 20th century and one of the only three from India, the other two being Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore. He has been described by the United Nations Environment Programme as “the Father of Economic Ecology” because of his leadership of the green revolution movement in agriculture and by Javier Perez de Cuellar, Secretary General of the United Nations, as “a living legend who will go into the annals of history as a world scientist of rare distinction.”

Professor M S Swaminathan was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership in 1971, the Albert Einstein World Science Award in 1986, the first World Food Prize in 1987, and Volvo, Tyler and UNEP Sasakawa Prize for Environment, the Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development in 2000 and the Franklin D Roosevelt Four Freedoms Medal, the Mahatma Gandhi Prize of UNESCO in 2000 and the Lal Bahadur Sastri National Award (2007). He is the recipient of Padma Shri (1967), Padma Bhushan (1972) and Padma Vibushan (1989).

He was a Member of the Parliament (Rajya Sabha), during 2007-13. During 2010-13, he chaired a high-level panel of experts for the World Committee on Food Security (CFS). He also Chairs the Task Force set up by the Ministry of External Affairs to oversee the projects undertaken in Afghanistan and Myanmar in the field of agriculture. In 2013, Professor M S Swaminathan received the Indira Gandhi Award for National Integration and Greatest Global Living Legend Award of NDTV. He was also elected at the 20th International Congress of Nutrition held at Granada, Spain, “as Living Legend of International Union of Nutrition Sciences”.

He received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 9th Nutra Summit in Bengaluru. He received the “Yerarinjar” (agricultural legend) award for his work in sustainable agriculture in India. He received Bharath Shanthi Dootha Award, 2017 (World Peace Festival Society, Warangal).  He is also the recipient of the World Agriculture Prize (2018).

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