Access to learning opportunities
for every child
The lack of access to learning opportunities is a complex and multidimensional problem. It impacts the lives of millions of children on a daily basis. In response, Nandan Nilekani, Rohini Nilekani and Shankar Maruwada co-founded EkStep Foundation to address the challenge at scale - leading to Mission EkStep and the creation of Sunbird as open digital infrastructure, and the curation of Societal Platform thinking.
EKSTEP INITATIVES
EkStep’s mission is to improve literacy and numeracy by enhancing access to learning opportunities for 200 million children in India.
Sunbird is an open-source, configurable, extendable, modular, digital infrastructure for learning designed for scale and available under MIT license.
Large-scale societal challenges call for a new way of thinking that enables rapid sustainable development.
People
Nandan Nilekani
Nandan Nilekani is the Co-Founder and Chairperson of EkStep Foundation. He is the Co-Founder and Chairman of Infosys Technologies Limited. He was the Founding Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) in the rank of a Cabinet Minister from 2009- 2014. Born in Bengaluru, Nilekani received his Bachelor’s degree from IIT, Bombay. Fortune Magazine conferred him with “Asia’s Businessman of the year 2003”.
Nandan Nilekani
Is the Co-Founder and Chairperson of EkStep Foundation. He is the Co-Founder and Chairman of Infosys Technologies Limited. He was the Founding Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) in the rank of a Cabinet Minister from 2009- 2014.
Born in Bengaluru, Nilekani received his Bachelor’s degree from IIT, Bombay. Fortune Magazine conferred him with “Asia’s Businessman of the year 2003”. In 2005 he received the prestigious Joseph Schumpeter prize for innovative services in economy, economic sciences and politics .In 2006, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan. He was also named Businessman of the year by Forbes Asia. Time magazine listed him as one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2006 & 2009. Foreign Policy magazine listed him as one of the Top 100 Global thinkers in 2010. He won The Economist Social & Economic Innovation Award for his leadership of India’s Unique Identification initiative (Aadhaar). In 2017, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from E & Y. CNBC- TV 18 conferred India Business leader award for outstanding contributor to the Indian Economy-2017 and he also received the 22nd Nikkei Asia Prize for Economic & Business Innovation 2017. He has been inducted as International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019.
Nandan Nilekani is the author of “Imagining India” and co- authored his second book with Viral Shah, “Rebooting India: Realizing a Billion Aspirations”.
Rohini Nilekani
Rohini Nilekani is the Co-Founder and Director of EkStep Foundation. She is the Chairperson of Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies. She is also the Founder of Arghyam, a foundation she set up for sustainable water and sanitation, which funds initiatives all across India. From 2004 to 2014, she was Founder-Chairperson and chief funder of Pratham Books, a non-profit children’s publisher that reached millions of children during her tenure. She sits on the Board of Trustees of ATREE.
Rohini Nilekani
Is the Co-Founder and Director of EkStep Foundation. She is the Chairperson of Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies. She is also the Founder of Arghyam, a foundation she set up for sustainable water and sanitation, which funds initiatives all across India.She is also the Founder of Arghyam, a foundation she set up for sustainable water and sanitation, which funds initiatives all across India. From 2004 to 2014, she was Founder-Chairperson and chief funder of Pratham Books, a non-profit children’s publisher that reached millions of children during her tenure. She sits on the Board of Trustees of ATREE, an environmental think tank, and served on the Eminent Persons Advisory Group of the Competition Commission of India.
A former journalist, she has written for many leading publications such as Times of India, India Today, Mint, etc. Penguin Books India published her first book, a medical thriller called Stillborn, and her second non- fiction book, ‘Uncommon Ground’, based on her eponymous TV show. She has written several books for young children, published by Pratham Books including the popular "Annual Haircut Day”. In 2017, she was inducted as Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is member of the Board of Science Gallery Bengaluru and the Advisory Board of the Well Being Project from 2019.
Rohini Nilekani is a committed philanthropist and in 2017, she, together with her husband Nandan Nilekani, signed the Giving Pledge, which commits half their wealth to philanthropic causes.
Shankar Maruwada
Shankar Maruwada is the Co-Founder and CEO of EkStep Foundation. He has more than 25 years of experience across corporate, entrepreneurial, nonprofit and government sectors. This allows him to bring the best of thinking from different lenses, which he has used in shaping EkStep’s mission and it's strategic choices of achieving population scale impact for learning, using technology. He is deeply passionate about data, research and leveraging technology for large scale transformation in society.
Shankar Maruwada
Is the Co-Founder and CEO of EkStep Foundation, a philanthropic mission he co-founded in 2015 along with Nandan Nilekani and Rohini Nilekani, to improve basic education for 200 million children in India.
He has more than 25 years of experience across corporate, entrepreneurial, nonprofit and government sectors. This allows him to bring the best of thinking from different lenses, which he has used in shaping EkStep’s mission and it's strategic choices of achieving population scale impact for learning, using technology.
Shankar is deeply passionate about data, research and leveraging technology for large scale transformation in society. He was part of the startup team at Aadhaar; he was also responsible for naming it. He also set up one of India’s first data analytics companies - Marketics. This cross-sectorial experience and interdisciplinary approach has been a driving force in pursuing scale solutions, innovations and collaborations for EkStep’s education mission.
He takes to heart the opportunities he has received as a result of the best possible higher education in India, which was subsidised by India’s tax payers. His alma mater IIT Kharagpur’s motto of ‘yogah karmasu kaushalam’ (Yoga is excellence at work) and its message of ‘Dedicated to the service of the nation’ is also his chosen path in life. He is also an alumnus of Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. He is a mentor to startups, social entrepreneurs and not-for-profits.
Shankar values the diversity that comes from his experience of having lived and grown up in the north, south, east and west of India. His greatest achievement is being a proud husband and a playful father.
Nandan Nilekani
Is the Co-Founder and Chairperson of EkStep Foundation. He is the Co-Founder and Chairman of Infosys Technologies Limited. He was the Founding Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) in the rank of a Cabinet Minister from 2009- 2014.
Born in Bengaluru, Nilekani received his Bachelor’s degree from IIT, Bombay. Fortune Magazine conferred him with “Asia’s Businessman of the year 2003”. In 2005 he received the prestigious Joseph Schumpeter prize for innovative services in economy, economic sciences and politics .In 2006, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan. He was also named Businessman of the year by Forbes Asia. Time magazine listed him as one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2006 & 2009. Foreign Policy magazine listed him as one of the Top 100 Global thinkers in 2010. He won The Economist Social & Economic Innovation Award for his leadership of India’s Unique Identification initiative (Aadhaar). In 2017, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from E & Y. CNBC- TV 18 conferred India Business leader award for outstanding contributor to the Indian Economy-2017 and he also received the 22nd Nikkei Asia Prize for Economic & Business Innovation 2017. He has been inducted as International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019.
Nandan Nilekani is the author of “Imagining India” and co- authored his second book with Viral Shah, “Rebooting India: Realizing a Billion Aspirations”.
Rohini Nilekani
Is the Co-Founder and Director of EkStep Foundation. She is the Chairperson of Rohini Nilekani Philanthropies. She is also the Founder of Arghyam, a foundation she set up for sustainable water and sanitation, which funds initiatives all across India. She is also the Founder of Arghyam, a foundation she set up for sustainable water and sanitation, which funds initiatives all across India. From 2004 to 2014, she was Founder-Chairperson and chief funder of Pratham Books, a non-profit children’s publisher that reached millions of children during her tenure. She sits on the Board of Trustees of ATREE, an environmental think tank, and served on the Eminent Persons Advisory Group of the Competition Commission of India.
A former journalist, she has written for many leading publications such as Times of India, India Today, Mint, etc. Penguin Books India published her first book, a medical thriller called Stillborn, and her second non- fiction book, ‘Uncommon Ground’, based on her eponymous TV show. She has written several books for young children, published by Pratham Books including the popular "Annual Haircut Day”. In 2017, she was inducted as Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is member of the Board of Science Gallery Bengaluru and the Advisory Board of the Well Being Project from 2019.
Rohini Nilekani is a committed philanthropist and in 2017, she, together with her husband Nandan Nilekani, signed the Giving Pledge, which commits half their wealth to philanthropic causes.
Shankar Maruwada
Is the Co-Founder and CEO of EkStep Foundation, a philanthropic mission he co-founded in 2015 along with Nandan Nilekani and Rohini Nilekani, to improve basic education for 200 million children in India.
He has more than 25 years of experience across corporate, entrepreneurial, nonprofit and government sectors. This allows him to bring the best of thinking from different lenses, which he has used in shaping EkStep’s mission and it's strategic choices of achieving population scale impact for learning, using technology.
Shankar is deeply passionate about data, research and leveraging technology for large scale transformation in society. He was part of the startup team at Aadhaar; he was also responsible for naming it. He also set up one of India’s first data analytics companies - Marketics. This cross-sectorial experience and interdisciplinary approach has been a driving force in pursuing scale solutions, innovations and collaborations for EkStep’s education mission.
He takes to heart the opportunities he has received as a result of the best possible higher education in India, which was subsidised by India’s tax payers. His alma mater IIT Kharagpur’s motto of ‘yogah karmasu kaushalam’ (Yoga is excellence at work) and its message of ‘Dedicated to the service of the nation’ is also his chosen path in life. He is also an alumnus of Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. He is a mentor to startups, social entrepreneurs and not-for-profits.
Shankar values the diversity that comes from his experience of having lived and grown up in the north, south, east and west of India. His greatest achievement is being a proud husband and a playful father.
Quorum, No. 85, 7th Cross
4th Block, Koramangala
Bangalore - 560034
Karnataka, INDIA
For enquiries, email us at
info@ekstep.org