Abhijit Chavda Podcast

Swami Vigyanananda is the founder & Global chairman of World Hindu Foundation (WHF) and chief organiser of World Hindu Congress held in Delhi in 2014 and World Hindu Economic Forum (WHEF) 2015 in London.

Rajeev Chandrasekhar is the Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology and Union Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship. He is an Indian politician and entrepreneur, technocrat and is currently serving his third term as a Member of Parliament in the upper house (Rajya Sabha) from BJP representing Karnataka. He is the founder and Advisor to the Board of Jupiter Capital Pvt. Ltd.

Padma Bhushan Awardee Kamlesh D. Patel also known as Daaji among his followers, is a spiritual leader, author and the fourth in the line of Raja yoga masters in the Sahaj Marg system of spiritual practice. He has been the president of Shri Ram Chandra Mission, a non-profit organization founded in 1945 and associated with the United Nations Department of Public Information, since 2014.

Yusuf Unjhawala is Editor, Indian Defence Analysis, an online forum on defence and strategic affairs of India. He comments extensively on defence and strategic affairs.

Sandeep Balakrishna is a writer and author of Indian history, Hindu civilization and culture for about two decades. He is the founder and editor of The Dharma Dispatch, an online journal dedicated to Indian civilisation, culture and history. He is the author of books such as "Invaders and Infidels" and "Tipu Sultan: the Tyrant of Mysore" among others, and has translated S. L. Bhyrappa's Aavarana from Kannada to English.

Dr. Arindam Ghosh is an Indian experimental condensed matter physicist and a Professor in the Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. He was awarded the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for science and technology, the highest science award in India, for the year 2012 in physical sciences category. In 2020, he was awarded the Infosys Prize for Physical Science, the most prestigious award that recognizes achievements in science and research, in India.

T. V. Mohandas Pai is a Padma Shri Awardee and former CFO and Board Member at Infosys. He is also the co-founder of Akshaya Patra, the world's largest midday meal program, and works actively with government and regulators on policy recommendations and guidelines. Mohan has served on the Board of SEBI, and was a Board Member of the National Stock Exchange in India. He has emerged as one of India's most prolific Technology investors. He has helped start over 14 different funds in venture, growth, and public markets. He also leads a private equity fund - Aarin Capital - along with Manipal Group Chairman Ranjan Pai that invests in life sciences, technology and education companies.

Rami Niranjan Desai is an Author, Anthropologist and a scholar of the North East region of India. She focuses on ethnic identity, tribal issues and insurgency. She also comments and keeps a track of developments on the Indo Pacific and current affairs. She regularly writes in all major newspapers and is a panelist on Hindi and English news channels. Prof. Bimol Akoijam teaches at the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Earlier, he was with the University of Delhi and the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi. Besides being a scholar-activist, he is also a filmmaker and theatre enthusiast.

Swati Sinha is one of the foremost practitioners of Kathak today. Having learnt the nuances of the Jaipur style of Kathak from the great master Pt Rajendra Gangani at the Kathak Kendra New Delhi, she has committed herself to practice and propagate the art form. She has performed all over the globe.

Abhijit Iyer-Mitra is a geopolitical analyst and researcher. His research focuses on defence issues, specialising in defence economics, technology and procurement, and nuclear dynamics. He also deals with governance issues and non-traditional security threats. He has been a Visiting Fellow at Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Stimson Center, Washington, DC. He holds an MA in International Relations from Monash University, Melbourne.

Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is a humanitarian, spiritual leader and an ambassador of peace and human values. Through his life and work, Gurudev has inspired millions around the world with a vision of a stress-free, violence-free world. He has designed programs that provide techniques and tools to live a deeper, more joyous life and has established nonprofit organizations that recognize the human identity beyond the boundaries of gender, race, nationality, and religion.

Shagun Butani is a leading exponent of Odissi dance and Seraikella Chhau. she trained in Odissi under masters like Smt. Aloka Panikar and the late Guru Gangadhar Pradhan, and in Seraikella Chhau from the late Guru Lingaraj Acharya and Guru Shashadhar Acharya.

Dr. Kanwal Sibal is India's former foreign secretary. He served as India's Ambassador to several countries, including France, Russia, and Turkey, where he played a crucial role in strengthening bilateral relations and promoting India's interests. He also represented India as the Deputy Chief of Mission in the United States and held various positions within the Ministry of External Affairs.

Velina Tchakarova is a geopolitical strategist and the founder of FACE, a geopolitical consulting company that provides expert analysis and solutions for the most relevant geopolitical risks, trends, and scenarios that may affect businesses or institutions. She is the former Head of Institute at the Austrian Institute for European and Security Policy (AIES) in Vienna, Austria. She is famous for coining the term #Dragonbear to describe the systemic coordination between China and Russia in key domains in international affairs.

The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) is India's preeminent center of science and engineering research. Not many are aware of the fascinating events and pivotal personalities, six in all, who contributed to making IISc the great institution it is today. Over its 125 or so history from its conception, launching, consolidation and looking forward to the future, it is really a microcosm of science in India. Abhijit Chavda walks and talks with Prof. Gautam Desiraju of the Solid State & Structural Chemistry Unit of IISc and converses about the early days of this wonderful institution.

Professor Gautam R. Desiraju is a renowned Indian chemist and educationist. He is one of the most highly cited Indian scientists with over 450 research papers, 60000+ citations and an h-index of 100. He has been in the Solid State and Structural Chemistry Unit of the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India since 2009. He is a member of the India Science-20 Secretariat in G20 India Presidency Year 2023. In this podcast we discuss Dr. Desiraju's new book "Bhārat: India 2.0" which analyzes and delineates the problems arising out of the Indian Constitution of 1950, and argues for changes that recast India as a civilizational state rather than a mere nation-state.

Padma Shri awardee Dr. Subhash Kak is an Indian-American computer scientist, theoretical physicist, historian, Indologist, Vedic scholar, linguist, philosopher, and poet. He is Regents Professor and Head of Computer Science Department at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater. In this podcast we discuss the groundbreaking research papers Dr. Kak has published over the past year and a half. The topics include Dr. Kak's new e-dimensionality theory of the universe, artificial intelligence and the limits of machine consciousness, and Vedanta.

Reela Hota is an eminent Odissi dance performer, yogi, educator and producer. She trained under the 3 doyens of Odissi dance, Guru Gangadhar Pradhan, Srimati Madhavi Mudgal and Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra. She has explored the philosophical underpinnings of classical arts in depth. She is credited for adding a new dimension to Odissi Dance – the spiritual aspect. She has explored themes such as the philosophy of yoga and Kundalini, a concept from the ancient tantric texts of India, in her productions. She has created productions that fuse Odissi with other classical dance forms of India such as Manipuri, Kathak, Bharatnatyam and Chhau. She has collaborated with artists from around the world. Reela Hota founded the Rays of Wisdom Society, an organization dedicated to highlighting how music, dance and vital therapeutic practices in traditional systems of healing can combine to meet lifestyle challenges of today.

Dr. Brian Keating is a Chancellor’s Distinguished Professor of physics at the Center for Astrophysics & Space Sciences (CASS) in the Department of Physics at the University of California, San Diego. He is a public speaker, inventor, and an expert in the study of the universe’s oldest light, the cosmic microwave background (CMB), using it to learn about the origin and evolution of the universe. Prof. #BrianKeating is a writer and podcaster and the best-selling author of one of Amazon Editors' "Best Non-fiction Books of All Time", Losing the Nobel Prize.

Chandrachur Ghose is an author, researcher and commentator on history, economics and environment. He has co-authored Conundrum: Subhas Bose's Life After Death. He is one of the founders of the pressure group Mission Netaji that has been the moving force behind the declassification of secret documents related to Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. His activism led to the declassification of over ten thousand pages in 2010.