Senior Management
Consultants
Staff
Dr. Suneeta Singh: Chief Executive Officer
Dr. Suneeta Singh has had over 25 years of experience in the development sector working in large multilateral and bilateral organizations, government positions, teaching institutions, and most recently, the private sector. She is the Technical Lead in Amaltas responsible forconceptualization, design, implementation, supervision,monitoring of research and consulting projects. She has been involved in the review and evaluation of major programs and policies internationally and in India.
She has led large research projects such as the Bill and Melinda Gates funded Evaluative Assessment of Avahan Transition and the Appraisal of the Immunization Technical Support Unit set up for Ministry of Health and Family Welfare; a Nordic Trust Fund for Human Rights supported assignment on Discrimination and its relationship with socio-economic status and life chances of sexual minorities in India; and the World Vision supported study on Determinants of Persisting Poor Child Health. Recent consulting projects include the IDRC commissioned evaluation of a 7 country Ecohealth initiative in South EastAsia – China; support to development of a Logical Frameworkfor a Save the Children project on Child Sensitive Child Protection; development of an advocacy document for the TCI Foundation’s work on HIV prevention among truckers in India; evaluation of an European Unionfunded Sustainable Textiles for Sustainable Development project, among others. Due to her involvement in projects at the interface of government and organizations desirous of policy impact, she has a fine understanding of policy making.
Trained as a medical doctor, Dr. Singh has led work on a variety of World Bank supported projects supporting Government programs such as HIV/AIDS, RCH, ICDS, Leprosy and Health Systems Development. Whilst at DFID, she developed the program of support to Andhra Pradesh on Tuberculosis. She has also worked previously with Ministry of Health and Family Welfare GoI, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences and the Lady Hardinge Medical College. She has been a Visiting Faculty at CEPT, Ahmedabad and the LBS National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie. She is on the Editorial Board of Global Health: Science and Policy an international indexed journal, has served as the Vice-Chair of the Institutional Human Ethics Committee of the National Institute of Biologicals, sits on the board of MAMTA, a child-centred NGO, and was a permanent invitee to the government sponsored Advanced Nursing Foundation. She has founded the Amrit Foundation of India, an NGO devoted to inclusion of all marginalized populations into the mainstream of society with a special focus on children with intellectual challenges. She has several publications to her credit. She is the author of ‘A People Stronger’ and other books. She has also published many reports and articles on issues of health, gender, evaluation and knowledge translation.
Jagmohan Kang: Senior Vice President - Projects
Jagmohan Kang is a seasoned public administrator with strong professional experience of over 35 years in health, population and nutrition. He has a track record of achieving results at the operational level, planning and management, national policy and international development. With many years of distinguished service at international organizations and in national and state governments, he has had extensive experience in preparing, supervising and managing sector-wide programs and projects in several countries; conducting policy dialogue with governments; negotiating with governments, donors and technical agencies; coordinating donor financial and technical inputs in national programs and directly managing large programs and organizations. Originally from the Indian Administrative Service, Mr. Kang served as international staff of the World Bank for over 16 years leading its work in Nepal, Bangladesh and India.
Mr. Kang has responsibility for oversight of the Amaltas project portfolio on quality and performance. He has been the Project Director of the M&E support to the Second Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project in Cambodia being carried out under the Ministry of Rural Development, and the Evaluation of Wellcome Trust support to capacity building at the Public Health Foundation of India with a consortium of UK Universities and served in that capacity for the Evaluative Assessment of the Gates Foundation funded Avahan HIV-AIDS prevention program in India and Sustainable Textiles for Sustainable Development projects. He has also been involved in the appraisal of the Immunization Technical Support Unit funded by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to chart out the transition pathways for immunization program in India.
R. Poornalingam: Principal Consultant
R. Poornalingam has wide experience in development administration in India. Before retiring from the Indian Administrative Service as Secretary to Government of India, he held many important
positions at the district, state and the national level. As Secretary of Health and Family Welfare in the Government of Tamil Nadu, he introduced several successful reforms including establishing
the well-known Tamil Nadu Medical Procurement Services Corporation, which several other state governments are following as a model. He made outstanding contributions in the power sector as the chairman
of the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board. Important positions that he held in the central government include Secretary to Government, Ministry of Textiles; Additional Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat; and
Additional Secretary, Ministry of Power.
Poornalingam has been actively involved in consulting after his retirement in 2005. Hehas worked on several assignments in the health and energy sectors. He worked with the
World Bank on management strengthening for the Government of Afghanistan; with DFID on procurement management of
health sector goods by the Government of India; and on procurement reforms in state governments to introduce the
concept of Essential Drug List and Standard Treatment Guidelines. Mr. Poornalingam has authored several
management books. He has worked with Amaltas on the Evaluative Assessment of Phase 2 of the Gates Foundation
funded Avahan Program in India and is on the advisory group of Springbox.
Dr. Sunita Mukherjee: Principal Consultant
Dr. Sunita Mukherjee, a national and international public administrator, has diverse experience in strategy development and management of large-scale programs. She has worked in the fields of reproductive health, youth, advocacy and resource mobilization. She has had over 22 years of experience in the Indian Administrative Service and another 16 years in UNFPA. While in the Indian Administrative Services, Dr. Mukherjee was involved in the design, development and implementation of programs aimed at improving the lives of people, especially the vulnerable and disadvantaged, both at state and national level.
At UNFPA, she has led culturally diverse teams in several South and South East Asian countries namely, Bangladesh, Maldives, Philippines and Sri Lanka. Dr. Mukherjee has successfully worked with central and local governments, NGOs, youth, religious leaders, civil society, other UN Agencies and donors to conceive, devise, develop and implement programs aimed at girls, women and the youth and address the needs of the country.
Meera Priyadarshi Marla: Principal Consultant
Meera P Marla is associated with Amaltas since January 2008 and has supported business development initiatives and provided lead technical support for the nutrition area. She led an assignment to develop the Commonwealth Nutrition Report for Save the Children titled ‘Common Wealth or Common Hunger?’ and supported Amaltas work on IFPRI consultations. Most recently she is working with the Price Waterhouse Cooper Technical Support Unit for ICDS IV; and has worked with the Global Alliance for Improving Nutrition on an appraisal of the India fortification project on rice; and on Integrated Program Development in Rajasthan and Bangladesh. Other important assignments include work with USAID Intra-Health Vistaar Project on the Coalition for a Sustainable Nutrition Secure India; gender and malnutrition in India; IGNOU course on nutrition for program managers; development of programs to tackle adolescent anemia; and response to the nutrition emergency in Bihar state. She has also developed training modules on health financing, social protection and purchasing and contracting for WHO SEARO.
Marla (nee Priyadarshi) was with the World Bank for 12 years as a Senior Nutrition Specialist and was the focal country staff for nutrition projects in India. She has co-led the Integrated Child Development Services Reform and TB Control projects; acted as advisor to India Development Market Place Initiatives Projects; supervised the Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand Health Systems Development Projects; and worked on projects in Bangladesh and Uganda. Prior to the Bank, she was associated with UNICEF and NORAD for over 20 years in the human development sector where she wrote and contributed to several technical reports and worked extensively on M&E design of Nutrition and Health Projects.
Dr. Madhusree Banerjee: Senior Consultant
Dr. Madhusree Banerjee is a senior social and development professional with extensive experience of working in grassroots organizations in India and Bangladesh. Her basic training is in Political Science and International Relations. Dr. Banerjee worked closely with the Amaltas team on evaluation of the Sustainable Textiles for Sustainable Development project. A consultant since 2007, she has worked extensively with the government on several flagship projects like Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, National Skills Development Policy, National Rural Livelihoods Mission, Mission Convergence and upcoming National Urban Livelihoods Mission with different Ministries of theGovernment of India. She has also worked extensively with bilateral and multilateral organizations like the World Bank, ADB, ILO, UNDP and DFID. Her area of expertise includes social development including livelihoods and skill training and she has successfully completed assignments with DFID, ADB and the World Bank.
Dr.Banerjee was the India lead for advocacy and campaigns of Oxfam India in 2003-2004. She has also worked with CARE India on microfinance and women’s enterprise in the backward Districts of Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. She has coordinated major projects spanning across different states and in different countries. She has a good mix of experience in both research and grassroots realities giving her work a cutting edge.
Dr. Aku Kwamie: Senior Consultant
Dr. Kwamie is a health policy and systems researcher with expertise in health systems governance, management and leadership, complexity theory, and realist evaluation. She has worked extensively in the West Africa region and in international settings. Her growing interests in learning organizations, public sector innovation and accountability makes her an appropriate team member in this regard. To this end, Dr. Kwamie has been involved in building more reflective practice into doctoral-level health systems training in anglophone and francophone West Africa, and capacity strengthening of ministries of health.
She is also holder of the prestigious Next Einstein Fellowship, and is deeply committed to promoting high quality African science for development. Dr. Kwamie holds a doctorate degree from Wageningen University, The Netherlands and undergraduate and postgraduate degrees from the University of Toronto, Canada, and King’s College London (UK) respectively.
Dr. Chittaranjan Mishra: Manager-Research
Dr. Mishra is a research and evaluation specialist with a career spanning over 12 years in the development sector. His areas of specialization include managing large research studies and impact assessment of programs, quality control, data analysis and report writing. He holds a doctorate from the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. At Amaltas, he serves as the technical lead on a study titled ‘Relationship between Discrimination, Social Capital and Life Chances among LBGT groups in India’ for the World Bank. Other important assignment that he is working on include M&E support on Second Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project in Cambodia for Ministry of Rural Development, Cambodia.
Dr. Mishra’s previous experience includes work with a number of research and development consulting organizations on a range of social and development issues. He has worked on a number of evaluation and impact assessment studies for UNICEF, WFP, BBC-WST, and state and national governments on topics such as public health, nutrition, food security, watershed management, women’s rights, child labor, women’s rights and disability. He was a key member of the design team of the sanitation and gender action plan of the World Bank financed Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project in low-income states of India.
Nivedita Parashar : Project Analyst
Nivedita Parashar holds a Post Graduate Degree in Sociology from Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi and an undergraduate degree in Business Studies from Delhi University. At Amaltas, she is currently working on developing the WHO Country Office (India) proposal to WHO HQ for funding of activities under the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) initiative. Previously, she have worked on assignments to develop the logical framework and monitoring and learning framework for the Tata Trusts’ “Making It Happen” Project in Andhra Pradesh; to support the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s contribution to leadership and ownership of health and nutrition goals by government of Bihar. She has provided research and documentation support to various other consulting assignments on public health.
She has worked with Swaniti Initiative for creating an online repository for briefs on Central Government Schemes. Prior to pursuing her post-graduation she worked at PRS Legislative Research as a Legislative Assistant to Member of Parliament (LAMP) Fellow to Lok Sabha MP from Bihar.
Apurva Rastogi: Senior Project Analyst
Apurva Rastogi is a key member of the Amaltas team. She anchors the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation project providing evaluation support services for all its programs in the country. As a lead of the team supporting the Amrit Foundation of India, she provides valuable inputs to its flagship program, The Little Peepul Tree, on intellectual challenges among children. She has worked on the World Bank funded research study - Resilience of LGBT students on Delhi Campuses; an IDRC project - Evaluating Research Excellence: Actionable Knowledge through Synthesis and Frameworks - Testing the Research Quality Plus Framework; Evaluation of Partners for Law in Development and contributed to the Final Evaluation of UN Women Support to the PWN+ on HIV/AIDS Projects. She was also part of the team working on the Evaluative Assessment of Phase 2 of the Bill and Melinda Gates-funded Avahan program.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she worked as an intern in ICRW, New Delhi on the qualitative assessment of Correlates of Gender based Violence in UP. She has also worked with the WHO on Climate Sensitive Diseases in districts of Haryana, and with Plan India on the Assessment of Health Seeking behavior on Exclusive Breast Feeding and Immunization Practices. Rastogi holds a post-graduate Diploma in Health Management from the International Institute of Health Management Research, New Delhi and an undergraduate degree in Biological Sciences from Delhi University.
Shivanshi Kapoor: Senior Project Analyst
Shivanshi Kapoor holds a Masters in Economics from Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune and an undergraduate degree in Economics from Daulat Ram College, University of Delhi. At Amaltas, she is currently anchoring a project for International Development Research Centre to provide support to a cohort of 10 projects across MENA and West Africa region over the 4-year implementation cycle to ensure research rigor and research standards across the implementation projects. She has also worked as a key team member on a BMGF-funded Process Review of the Coalition for Food and Nutrition Security. She has also led the Political Economy Analysis of Tuberculosis in India funded by USAID and was actively involved as a key team member on Evaluation of One Full Meal Programme in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana for Unicef. She has also been a key team member on the evaluation of Immunization Technical Support Unit funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She has provided research and writing support for various other projects on social equity and adolescent health in India. She has also been a key team member of the Patang Survey which looked at barriers encountered by caregivers in accessing services for their children with intellectual disability. As a knowledge officer she volunteers her time for the sister organization Amrit Foundation of India by overseeing their quarterly publications like the Fast Facts and e-Newsletters.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she worked as a research associate at the Ministry of Finance and assisted in preparing a report on the Efficient utilization of funds disbursed from the Central Government with a special focus on NRHM. She has also worked as a project associate in Socio Economic Research Institute and initiated developmental projects on Child Education and Vocational Training for Marginalized Women. Her academic work includes writing a thesis entitled “Health sector in India-International Comparisons, Improvement Thus Far and the Way Ahead.” She has also been associated with Chetanalaya, a non-government organization where she researched topics such as Promotion of Education in India.
Kriti Kaushal: Project Manager
Kriti Kaushal holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Rural Management from the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA), Gujarat and an undergraduate degree in Business Studies from Delhi University. At Amaltas, she is currently developing a project management dashboard for the immunizations department at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She is also anchoring a consulting assignment supporting BMGF’s contribution to leadership and ownership of health and nutrition goals by the Bihar government. She recently led the evaluation of the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust supported project on Reducing Avoidable Blindness in India. She has been a key team member for the documentation of the Nutrition Missions of Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra with Results for Development for Unicef, appraisal of the Immunization Technical Support Unit for Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the assessment of Extension Phase of the ‘Wellcome Trust Capacity Development Grant to PHFI for strengthening India’s public health institutional systems’.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she worked as an intern in the Corporate Social Responsibility division of Tata Chemicals Limited in the field of intervention design for community development. She has also interned with a Himachal Pradesh based NGO – Rural Centre for Human Interests (RUCHI) for strengthening the conditions of Self Help Groups in a district of the state. She worked with Educomp Solutions Limited as a Content and Marketing Associate prior to taking up her postgraduate studies.
Nandika Kumari: Senior Research Analyst
NandikaKumari has a Masters in Human Rights from the London School of Economics. She completed her Bachelors in Sociology from St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai. At Amaltas she is working on evaluating innovations by UNICEF in the Government of India’s Weekly Iron-Folic Acid Supplementation Program. She has also been project anchor on a mapping project for the Research Councils of UK. She is also involved in the work of Amrit Foundation of India, where she provides strategic, research and logistical assistance.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she worked as Project Manager at Pehchan Foundation in Mumbai, building leadership among homeless citizens and empowering them to access government services. She has also been a Programs Assistant at the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, London working on developing stringent and enforceable human rights norms among the Commonwealth nations.
Ujjwal Gupta: Project Analyst
Ujjwal Gupta has graduated from the University of Warwick, United Kingdom with a Bachelors of Science in Management. At Amaltas, he is currently working on a 5 country project evaluating WHO';s contribution to Maternal Health in the South East Asia region. He has been a key team member in a project commissioned by the Research Councils of UK to map the research landscape in India in the field of ‘Public Health and Well Being’ and ‘Rapid Urbanisation and Sustainable Cities’. He conducted bibliometric analysis for 2 reports commissioned by them, and conducted Delphi interviews with active researchers in the field He also provided research support for the Nordic Trust Fund report titled ‘Experienced discrimination and its relationship with socio-economic status and life chances of sexual minorities in India’. He has worked on the development of multiple proposals for evaluation and research projects.
Ujjwal also volunteers at the Amrit Foundation of India where he provides strategic and research support. As a part of advocacy for Amrit, Ujjwal has been published on Youth Ki Awaaz, a leading online media platform, for articles titled ';Am I Differently Sexed If I am Differently Abled?'; and ';We All Fit In. Really?';.
Rhea Chawla: Junior Research Analyst
Rhea Chawla has a Bachelor of Arts in Biology from Reed College where she specialized in the effects of mutations on fitness in an indicator species. At Amaltas, she is working on the Extension Phase of the Wellcome Trust Capacity Development Grant – An Evaluative Assessment. As a key team member of the Amrit Foundation of India, she is working towards enhancing the visibility of children with intellectual challenges under the The Little Peepul Tree project. She is responsible for networking and maintaining a database of like-minded institutions and professionals.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she worked as a Research Assistant in the Genetics laboratory of Dr. Sarah Schaack at Reed College. She participated in ongoing researches by drafting grant proposals, designing, conducting and analyzing experimental procedures as well as contributing to manuscript preparation of projects. She has over seven years of experience working with and mentoring 0-12 year olds in an educational as well as casual setting.
Vini Prerna: Research Analyst
Vini Prerna holds a post graduate degree in Development Studies from B.R. Ambedkar University, Delhi and an undergraduate degree in Political Science from Delhi University. At Amaltas, she is currently offering research support to a cohort of implementation research projects funded by International Development Research Centre in MENA (Middle East & North Africa) and West Africa regions in the thematic areas of Health Information Systems and Adolescent, Reproductive and Sexual Health. She recently contributed towards conducting a desk review for WHO country office to provide technical assistance to Government of India in the area of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights. She was also involved in a project by Abt Associates and USAID on the Political Economy Analysis of Tuberculosis in India to examine how the private sector can be leveraged to meet the goals of TB program in India.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she worked as an intern with Dr. Babu P Remesh (Professor, Development Studies, Ambedkar University), on a study aimed at researching the landscape of Radio Taxi and Cab aggregators in Delhi - NCR. She has also been associated with a travel guide magazine (Vasundhara Media Pvt. Ltd.) as a correspondent.
Tom Augustine: Manager-Administration
Tom Augustine has over 19 years of work experience in office administration. At Amaltas, he has been responsible for several activities, providing support on business documentation, budgeting, financial management, procurement, accounting and business administration. He is an active member of the project planning and implementation teams, providing budget development, financial management and logistical support.
Prior to joining Amaltas, Mr. Augustine was Secretary and Project Assistant in the Wildlife Trust of India for over six years. Based on his experience, he was designated to work as Technical Assistant with the Wildlife Crime Cell – Ministry of Environment and Forests.
Archana Kharyal: Senior Research Analyst
Archana Kharyal holds a Ph.D in Human Biology from Punjabi University, Punjab and aPostgraduate degree in Anthropology from Delhi University. At Amaltas, she is currently developing a logical framework for the “Making it happen” project of Tata Trusts. He is also providing research and analysis support to a process review of the Coalition for Food and Nutrition Security in India.
Prior to joining Amaltas, she has worked as a Research Fellow in Public Health Foundation of India and managed a project on neonatal mortality in Bihar. She worked as a Research officer in SAHAYOG India and handled projects on maternal health, reproductive rights and adolescent health.She was a Research assistant in INCLEN India and worked on IMNCI infant mortality rate (in eight states) project which was funded by UNICEF & USAID. She was also worked as a consultant for the Clinton Health Access Initiative on diarrhoea end line project in four states, GfK mode on the study of Knowledge Aptitude and Practices (KAP) of Tuberculosis in seventeen states of India and also on report preparation for concurrent evaluation of National Health Rural Mission.
DR. Chittaranjan Mishra: Project Associate
Chittaranjan Mishra is an evaluation and impact assessment specialist with a career spanning over 12 years in the development sector. Among the several assignments that he has anchored at Amaltas are the External Evaluation of the EU funded Sustainable Textiles for Sustainable Development project for Traidcraft Exchange, M&E support provided by Amaltas to the Ministry of Rural Development, Cambodia on Second Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project and developing a M&E framework for Child Sensitive Social Protection Program for Save the Children Finland. He is a member of the team working on the Evaluative Assessment of the Wellcome Trust supported Capacity Development Grant to the Public Health Foundation of India. He is currently engaged in a Nordic Trust Fund funded study on discrimination and its relationship with socio-economic status and life chances of sexual minorities in India. His areas of specialization include designing M&E framework for projects, managing quantitative and qualitative research studies and impact assessment of programs, quality control, data analysis and report writing.
Prior to joining Amaltas, Dr. Mishra has worked with a number of research organizations and development consultancy firms. He has worked on various human rights issues in Manavadhikar Samajik Manch. At CMS Social he executed a large number of evaluation and impact assessment studies for UNICEF, UNWFP, UNAID, BBC-WST etc. and for various state and central governments in the areas of public health, nutrition, food security, watershed management, child labor and disability. He provided support in designing the M&E framework and executed the baseline for the GoI- UN Women Program on Promoting Women’s Political Leadership and Governance in India and South Asia. He was a key member of the team to design the sanitation and gender action plan of the World Bank‐financed Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project in Low Income States of India. Dr. Mishra holds a doctorate from the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
MS. Falak Raza::Research Analyst
Falak Raza holds a post graduate degree in Development Studies from B. R. Ambedkar University, Delhi and an undergraduate degree in Economics from Delhi University. At Amaltas, she has anchored the BMGF-funded Process Review of the Coalition for Food and Nutrition Security. She was team leader on the Evaluation of the Single Window Initiative in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, which aims to empower sex workers and transgender persons through ensuring access to entitlements, and made key contributions to Documentation of Nutritional Rehabilitation Centres in Odisha aimed at reducing incidence of severe acute malnutrition in the state, where her work encompassed conducting extensive data analysis and writing the final report.
Prior to joining Amaltas, Ms. Raza was associated with the Centre for Policy Research where she worked on inequalities in India’s education with respect to disadvantaged and marginalized communities, and with a Delhi-based NGO where she was a key team member for several research projects in the education space. She has worked with the University of Ottawa (Canada) on ‘School Choice’ and reservation in private schools under the Right to Education Act in India, made contributions to a project sanctioned by the Government of Maharashtra on status of secondary education in the State, and has also led the impact evaluation of Shikshak Samman Awards, an initiative by the Tech Mahindra Foundation for government school teachers. She has further experience of in-depth immersion and village study, participative research methodologies and social mapping.
