A major part of what KGVK does is who KGVK is: a team of people from diverse walks of life, united by a shared objective. A team of dreamers, who share a vision of New India, and doers, who share the labour of building it.

Here we are:

BK Jhawar
President, KGVK

Mr. B K Jhawar, 73, Chairman, Usha Martin Group, founded the company in 1960 in Jharkhand, a major private sector investment in a tribal-dominated area. Partnering Martin Black, a Scottish wire rope company, Mr. Jhawar envisaged a globally flat business model in the pre-liberalized Indian economy. Today, the global conglomerate with annual revenues approaching USD 1 billion is involved in the business of specialty steel, wire rope and other value-added steel products as well as optic fibres and jelly-filled cables for the telecom industry. Usha Martin, the Group's flagship company, is one of the world's largest steel wire rope manufacturers. It has a trans-continental presence with strategic activities in manufacturing, marketing, distribution and services in USA, UK, Australia, Singapore, Bangkok, Baku, Vietnam, Thailand, Dubai and South Africa. The Group has continued to increase its relevance in the dynamic global economic environment by diversifying into information technologies, telecom billing solutions and business process outsourcing.

While branching out globally, Mr. Jhawar continued to strengthen his roots: Jharkhand, from where the journey began. Jharkhand is India's most mineral-rich yet one of the impoverished states with 60 per cent living below the poverty line. Mr. Jhawar's commitment to rural social uplift from the grassroots led to the formation of Krishi Gram Vikas Kendra, Usha Martin's CSR arm. Usha Martin invests a significant percentage of its resources into community development projects with the goal of integrated prosperity in rural Jharkhand through KGVK. Thirty-five years of unwavering commitment to social responsibility in Jharkhand has won KGVK numerous awards, including the TERI Corporate Social Responsibility Award in 2006 bestowed by the then President of India, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam.

KGVK undertakes various development initiatives, following a public-private-people's partnership (P4) approach and the Total Village Management (TVM) model. Significantly, the successful deployment of Total Productivity Maintenance in Usha Martin plants inspired Mr. Jhawar to adapt and adopt the TPM model to TVM. Working closely with rural communities in five large districts of Jharkhand, the TVM model identified eight key tipping points for poverty alleviation – natural resource management, education, health-hygiene-sanitation, livelihoods, capacity building, infrastructure, resource mobilization and renewable energy. These initiatives build both natural and human capital, with a distinctive focus on enterprise development and sustainable income generation. Usha Martin and KGVK have proactively sought out and achieved sustainable partnerships in this endeavour. Reputable and vibrant partners include UNDP, USAID, International Finance Corporation (World Bank Group, Washington), Austrian Development Agency, United Kingdom, India Canada Environment Facility, Sir Ratan Tata Trust, India, Child in Need Institute, India, ISRO and many others.

One of Mr. Jhawar's pioneering experiments in creating social infrastructure has been the creation of TVM Gurukul in 2006, which is what Mr. Jhawar calls a "barefoot B-school" offering auxiliary nurse and midwife courses, health worker courses and vocational training for rural youth. Gurukul facilities include classrooms, library, dairy and demonstration farm, virtual classrooms powered by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and residential hostels. TVM Gurukul is a one-of-a-kind institute that unlocks the potential of rural students, linking them to dynamic India.

Similarly, Mr. Jhawar worked to unlock opportunities for corporate expansion. Usha Martin diversified into steel with Usha Alloys Steel in 1971, wire drawings in collaboration with Marshall Richards Breco Ltd in 1975 and cables with Usha Beltron in 1987. From 1990s onwards, even as the Group consolidated its manufacturing initiatives worldwide, Mr. Jhawar, at the helm of his family-run business, showed foresight in letting the family's younger generation both consolidate and diversify into technology-led enterprises. Ushacomm India, a leading provider of convergent billing and BSS solutions for the telecom industry, was instituted in 1994 and acquired Epixcomm a decade later. In 2000, the Group acquired Brunton Shaw, a UK-based wire rope manufacturing company. In the same year, the Group ventured into software application development and consultancy for telecom technologies.

Apart from serving the UM Group as Chairman and KGVK as President, Mr. Jhawar is/has been associated with companies like Orient Paper & Industries Limited and Reliance Chemotex Industries Limited. Organizations like Confederation of Indian Industries' National Committee on Social Infrastructure Development and Affirmative Action, ICICI, UTI (as a nominee of Industrial Bank) National Foundation of India, the Commonwealth Business Council and the British Business Group. He is also linked with educational institutions like LN Mittal Institute of Information and Technology, Jaipur, Birla High School, Kolkata, XLRI School of Business and Human Resources, Jamshedpur, and Indian Institute for Production Management, Lucknow. The Usha Martin Academy, an institute with a centre each at Kolkata and Ranchi for students interested in a career in technology-driven sectors, is his brainchild.

Brij K. Jhawar
Vice President,  KGVK

He has contributed immensely to the development of high-value niche products and markets. He has led and supported the Usha Martin team in development of high-value wire ropes at all stages, which resulted in enlarging Usha Martin’s high value wire rope mix, and consequently, its international image.

Mr. Jhawar is very conscious of the social obligation of the industry and believes that it must help the nation in rural development. His creative thinking and unabated zeal institutionalized this charitable idea into a large integrated rural development complex in the name of KGVK formed in 1972.

Since its inception, KGVK, under his guidance, has been rendering valuable services in the field of agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry, watershed, health, education etc to empower the rural people of Jharkhand.

Dr. Jayanta Mitra
Secretary

Jayanta has worked as a change agent in the development sector for 15 years. An alumnus of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai, he completed his doctoral studies from TISS (with a partial affiliation from the University of Ottawa, Canada), and started out as a lecturer in his alma mater.  Jayanta has also held important positions in The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), New Delhi, India. To KGVK, Dr. Mitra brings his wealth of academic and field experience to conceptualize and manage projects with a P4 approach, which includes forging reciprocal relationships with government organizations, various local, national and international knowledge and resource partners as well as grassroots community-based organizations for Total Village Development. A firm grounding in evaluative action research and a keen passion for his job has helped him develop strategies in project conceptualization, management and monitoring, process documentation, and team building that emphasizes participatory dialogue among multi-stakeholders.

Shibaji Mandal
Director, Healthcare

A postgraduate in Hospital Management from IISW & BM, Kolkata, with a diploma in Business Management from ICFAI, Shibaji brings to KGVK ten years of experience in healthcare across different platforms like Corporate Marketing, Franchise Management and Public Health.

Shibaji was previously associated with Apollo Hospitals Group, managing its East and North Zones in Business Development. 

For the last two years, he has been heading the healthcare initiatives of KGVK.

Hemant Kumar

A forestry graduate from Birsa Agriculture University, Ranchi, Hemant started his career in development with PRADAN at its Godda project in March 1999. For the last 8 years, he has worked across Jharkhand, Bihar, Uttaranchal, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh with various organizations like Foundation for Development Research and Action (FDRA), Dehardun, Samarpit Sewa Sanstha, Dehradun, and Alternatives for India Development, Palamau before joining KGVK. He has mostly worked on natural resource management and livelihood projects. He is interested in watershed development and management of livelihood solutions.

KL Choudhary
Official, KGVK Member Resource Group

Notwithstanding his Masters degree in Commerce and MBA in marketing, Mr. Choudhury has been associated with grassroots activities for socio-economic development over the last two decades.

Ashok Kumar Bharti

With a mix of experience in various organizations over 23 years, Ashok is trained in Personnel Management and Industrial Relation. He has worked with national and international organizations like CASA and CARE, as well as corporate-sponsored NGOs like TSRDS. He specializes in Community Mobilization, Watershed Management, Capacity Building and Public Health.