CHETNA Team

As a Director of CHETNA, Pallavi Patel leads and guides the project and administration team to achieve the vision and mission of the organization. She is a founding member of CHETNA. Formally trained as a nutritionist, she has experience of 37 years of addressing the issues related to the health and nutrition of women, young people, and children from a gender perspective. She oversees the effective day to day operation of the organization including planning, implementation, execution, and evaluation of the projects. Her special interest is in adolescent health, health communication and maternal and child nutrition. She advocates for gender sensitive and comprehensive programmes and policies at the State and National level. She has presented and published papers at State, National and International levels. She has contributed in a book – Health Actions for Women Practical Strategies to mobilize for Change and Where Women have No Doctor published by Hesperian Foundation in February 2015 and Forth Printing 2010 which is translated in several international languages. She has provided consultancy to various NGOs in the baseline survey, strategic planning, and evaluation of the programmes.

Pushpa Joshi is a social scientist with Masters in Education Psychology and a PhD and over 29 years of experience in development sector. She has recently joined as Director, CHETNA India, bringing with her deep expertise across multilateral and international agencies as well as Government led initiatives. Prior to CHETNA she worked as Education Specialist with UNICEF for over 12 years in different locations, leading education program to support in formulating policy; strategizing, implementing and monitoring education initiatives especially for last mile children; supporting large scale programs through evidence-based planning, content development, partnerships, demonstrations and scaling up, advocacy, and knowledge creation. Pushpa began her professional journey with Lok Jumbish, a pioneering Government of Rajasthan initiative aimed at achieving universal access to quality education. She subsequently joined CARE India, where she managed the girls’ education portfolio in Rajasthan and led education components within a multi-sectoral programme in Gujarat. Before joining UNICEF, she worked as Program Director- Girls education Program at the national level in Room To Read. During her tenure with CARE and UNICEF, she also gained significant experience in humanitarian and emergency contexts, contributing to relief and rehabilitation efforts following the tsunami in Tamil Nadu, as well as flood response programmes in Bihar and Gujarat. Her technical expertise and areas of interest include Early Childhood Development, elementary education, adolescent programming, social and behaviour change, education for children with disabilities, and programming for last-mile children. Across her work, she brings a strong focus on gender equality, inclusion, and transformative approaches, with a commitment to advancing equitable and rights-based programming.

Anil Gajjar is a graphic designer associated with CHETNA since 1989. He specializes in designing health communication material especially print material and has designed for various projects of CHETNA. He has developed more than 250 teaching-learning materials in the form of interactive games, posters, pamphlets, models, etc. Some of them are mass-produced by government, corporate and NGOs to use in their existing programmes. He has showcased his paintings on Gender Equality in exhibitions at Jaipur, Ahmedabad, and Goa showcasing. He is also trained in photography and film making.