About Us
Executive Council of INZBC
INZBC is headed by a board of professionals who have been active in the realm of India - New Zealand business. The brief profiles of the current board are given below.
[Updated October 2024]
Board Members
BHARAT CHAWLA
Chair
Bharat has been a member of the India New Zealand Business Council board for the last two years. He is also a former member of the Institute of Directors, New Zealand, and a Chartered Manager (CMI UK) / Fellow at the Institute of Managers and Leaders, Australia and New Zealand. The Superdiversity Institute of Law and the Ministry of Ethnic Communities selected him as the Top Diverse board-ready director.
With a career spanning two decades in the International education space, Bharat has travelled to more than 40 countries and cultures. His unwavering commitment to integrity is evident in his approach to building business through solid relationships and exceptional customer service.
Looking ahead, Bharat's primary goal is to foster a robust education policy partnership
between India and New Zealand. His vision involves establishing New Zealand Education delivery centres in India and strengthening the collaboration between the two countries, with education at the forefront.
I follow a straightforward rule: “Together, we can make a small initiative a big success.” I
enjoy collaborating to help and improve the partnership.
JAY CHANGLANI
Board Member
Jay is a Chartered Accountant and a Director of Orb360, Chartered Accounting firm based in Auckland & Wellington. Jay has over 10 years of Accounting, forensic accounting and tax experience. Some of his previous roles includes, Tax Manager at Grant Thornton and Crowe Horwath (WHK), Tax Investigator at the IRD, Forensic Accountant at McDonald Vague, and Financial Accountant at Flight Centre.
Jay specializes in International and domestic tax. He provides a wide range of tax technical advice across all tax types. Jay has a wide range of experience and has a broad understanding of tax regimes.
The majority of his work involves providing technical tax advice, Tax planning, International tax and managing IRD disputes. He has a particular interest in tax due diligence, IRD disputes and International Tax.
EDWIN PAUL
Board Member
Edwin is a fond father, old-school audiophile, voyeur of the future, passionate chef, empathetic leader, innovation driver, complex problem solver, incessant entrepreneur, and an angel investor...discovering his IKIGAI.
Originally from Madras, Edwin has called Aotearoa home for over two decades. He is deeply committed to fostering commerce and trade between India and New Zealand, having founded and managed businesses in both nations. Edwin has
accompanied New Zealand's prime minister and ministers on business and ministerial delegations to the sub-continent as a trailblazer in facilitating mutually beneficial bilateral business engagements. With an unbridled passion exceeded only by his connections and capability, Edwin is adept at delivering impactful
collaborations between diverse stakeholders due to his extensive experience in government-to-government (G2G) and business-to-business (B2B) relations,
providing commercial and social benefits across borders.
Edwin's commitment to education is a part of his past and a driving force in his future. As a proud alumnus of the University of Auckland and the University of Oxford, he is passionate about transnational educational initiatives. Edwin looks forward to supporting organisations in the knowledge sector, helping them thrive and positively impact the communities they serve.
JONATHAN MANUEL
Treasurer
Jonathan is a sales and marketing professional from India. He has worked for several iconic brands for
15 years before embarking on his life’s passion into aviation.
He trained towards his Commercial Pilot Licence in New Zealand. Post completion of his CPL he worked
for a flight training organization in NZ and went on to work for the national airline – Air New Zealand. He has been actively promoting NZ’s aviation training capabilities to the global audience for the last 17 years. His endeavours have helped flight schools in NZ to be certificated by overseas aviation regulators and helped gain airline training contracts.
Jonathan along with his friend Celroy Mascarenhas and their respective wives started the New Zealand
Airline Academy (NZAAL) - a modern, state-of-the-art pilot training school in Oamaru, NZ. NZAAL beat 15 other globally recognised flight schools to be awarded the training contract to train Air Asia India cadet pilots. They recently acquired Eagle Flight Training; a flight training organisation primarily
focused on Vietnam.
Jonathan is currently the CEO & Director of New Zealand Airline Academy and Eagle Flight Training.
Jonathan has served on the board of Christchurch Educated to aid in the post-earthquake recovery of international education in Canterbury and currently serves on the board of India NZ Business council. He has been selected by the New Zealand Ministry of Ethnic Affairs as a Board ready Director.
Drawing on his own experience of being run over by a bus, being given up for dead and now pursuing his dreams, Jonathan passionately motivates youngsters to achieve their true potential in life.
EARL RATTRAY
Board Member
Earl Rattray is the immediate past Chair of INZBC.
Earl has a long-standing dairy industry career, both in farming, and in senior dairy industry leadership roles, including as a founding Director of the Fonterra Co-operative Group, and inaugural Chairman of the NZ Dairy Companies’ Association.
Earl is based in the Waikato. He is a director of several local Agri sector companies and chairs the governing board of Binsar Farms Pvt Ltd, a Haryana-based farming and fresh milk marketing company operating in the Delhi NCR. Earl had previously served as INZBC treasurer.
He is a cornerstone shareholder and company Chairman of Binsar Farms Pvt. Ltd, a pioneering Indian /NZ dairy farming and fresh milk marketing company in Sonipat, Haryana. Earl manages his own dairy industry consultancy, Dairy Link Ltd, specialising in New Zealand and Asia dairy sector insight and analysis.
JENNY MCGREGOR
Board Member
Jenny is a Senior Manager of Trade Strategy at Fonterra, responsible for driving Fonterra’s engagement and advocacy on key strategic global trade issues.
A former New Zealand official, Jenny has held a number of roles across Government, including at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) and Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), where she was Trade Policy Manager. In these roles, she has been a senior member of various New Zealand trade negotiating teams, leading agriculture negotiations during the CPTPP negotiations and representing New Zealand at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in Geneva.
Jenny joined Fonterra ten years ago and has worked closely on trade-related issues during this time, including as General Manager Trade Strategy. She has previously held roles on the Export NZ Advisory Board and on the NZ-US Business Council.
Jenny is a graduate of the University of Auckland with a Bachelors degree in Arts and Commerce. She also holds an Honours degree in Political Studies from Victoria University of Wellington.
CARMEN VICELICH
Board Member
Carmen Vicelich is the CEO and Founder of Valocity Global, and the CEO and Founder of Data Insight. She is not your typical anything – a powerhouse entrepreneur who has rapidly built two multi-million-dollar, international data and technology businesses at the same time as balancing life as a wife and mother of four young children.
Data Insight uses advanced analytics to help businesses leverage data to make data driven decisions and works with industry leaders across multiple verticals including government, utilities, telco, casino, FMCG, insurance and banking.
Valocity is a cloud based Mortgage
Lending Platform, that helps banks transform and streamline the mortgage valuation process to deliver improved customer experience with increased regulatory compliance.
PRINCE KUMAR
Board Member
Prince Kumar gained his Masters in Industrial Engineering from Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India and his Management degree from Loyola Institute of Business Administration, Chennai, India.
Prince received the “Pride of India”, “Rastriya Ekta”, and the Bharatiya Udyog Ratan” Awards for his contributions to the business community in India.
Prince has been a board member of India New Zealand Business Council in the past. He has been involved extensively in promoting New Zealand Education to various countries in Asia and predominantly in India. In 2012, he was part of the trade delegation to India led by Hon Prime Minister John Key. In recent years, Prince is also involved in import of biodegradable material for NZ market.
RACHEL LYNCH
Board Member
Rachel is Zespri’s Government and Community Affairs Manager and manages the team responsible for government engagement as well as policy, advocacy and trade strategy, along with Zespri’s New Zealand community investment programme.
Over the past 12 years at Zespri, Rachel has led communications, media and engagement work, as well as a period in new cultivar commericialisation, and successfully led the industry’s response to the EPA’s reassessment of the widely-used agrichemical hydrogen cyanamide (Hi-Cane). Rachel has an extensive background in strategic communications and public engagement, with experience across local and national government.
Executive Team
SUNIL KAUSHAL
General Manager
Sunil Kaushal is a frequent media commentator on Business, Commerce, and International Trade particularly focusing on India. He has first-hand on-the-ground experience in guiding New Zealand firms to expand into India.
Sunil has been the previous Chair of INZBC and has been providing strategic input to the organisation. He also serves on various boards of Not for Profit organisations and community groups.
He is frequently invited by industry and academia for comments on New Zealand and India.
SREEDHAR
VENKATRAM
Mumbai Chapter Head
Sreedhar Venkatram is the CEO - South Asia, for CricHQ New Zealand, a digital platform for sport which combines competition management and administration software with live scoring and statistics for cricket clubs.
A management professional, strategist and a person who loves cricket, Sreedhar, over the years has earned many feathers on his hat. Earlier he has successfully worked for New Zealand Trade & Enterprise (NZTE) as Senior Business Development Manager for over a decade. He is also the Chapter Head for India New Zealand Business Council in India. An optimist and a cricket fan, he believes it is time for India to hit those big boundaries in terms of trade reforms.
Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi
Ex-Officio
Kanwaljit has worked as a Member of Parliament in New Zealand for twelve years. During this time, he have had the opportunity to work with various communities, governmental sectors, and the public sector, as well as people from diverse backgrounds across the country. His lifelong goal has been to help people by identifying their concerns, addressing their issues, and contributing to building a better and more productive society. He wants to continue to contribute and is committed to continuing his efforts towards this end.
As an immigrant who moved to New Zealand, he started a business from scratch and took it to a successful level, which has equipped me with a multitude of skills. His experience in business administration and organization, as well as my background as a Member of Parliament will be invaluable to the Business Council.
DR. PUSHPAWOOD
Wellington Chapter Head
Dr Pushpa Wood has been appointed as an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the
Queen’s 90th Birthday Honours List for 2016 for her services to financial literacy and interfaith relations. She was the first Indian women to be awarded with this honour and the first person in New Zealand to receive an award for both financial literacy and interfaith relations.
Dr Wood has a long history of adult and financial literacy advocacy. She was previously the Education Manager at the Commission for Financial Capability. She has worked across the school, tertiary, NGO and industry sectors to improve adult literacy and financial literacy, and was a member of the New Zealand Qualifications Authority’s project advisory group reviewing financial literacy unit standards. Dr Wood has extensive experience in developing teaching and learning resources, training and development, strategic planning and stakeholder relationship.
BHARAT JOSHI
Delhi Chapter Head
Mr. Bharat R Joshi's career has spanned the roles of entrepreneur, author, social worker and mentor. Bharat is CEO of J-Curve Ventures Pvt. Ltd (www.jcurve.in).
J-Curve focuses on a range of verticals through 3 i’s–Insight+, Investment and Implementation, and has alliances with institutions in Germany (Fraunhofer IML), New Zealand, Hungary and Netherlands.
He serves on boards of ACTL (www.actlindia.com) and JKTI (Joshi Konoike Transport and Infrastructure).The companies have interests in logistics, technology and infrastructure.
Mr. Joshi has addressed fora in India, China, Japan, New Zealand and Europe. He’s a charter member of TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs), and was acknowledged in UNCTAD's World Investment Report 2006. He led a Future Leaders' delegation to Japan in 2017, upon invitation of
Japanese Government.
Clive Antony
Strategic Communications Officer
Clive Antony is a business leader based in Christchurch, New Zealand, known for his innovative approach to entrepreneurship and community engagement. He is the director of Antony & Mates, a leading creative agency specialising in marketing, branding, and strategic communication. Antony & Mates has garnered a reputation for delivering exceptional campaigns for a diverse clientele, ranging from local businesses to international brands such The Crusaders & Merlin.
In addition to his role at Antony & Mates, Clive runs the Be Better Group, a venture studio dedicated to nurturing startups and fostering business growth. The Be Better Group focuses on developing sustainable business practices and supporting entrepreneurial ventures that aim to make a positive impact on society.
Clive's commitment to community service is reflected in his involvement with several prominent organisations. He serves as a board member for The Arts Centre in Christchurch, chairs Watch This Space, an initiative dedicated to promoting street art, and is a board member of The Canterbury Club.
Passionate about enhancing productivity through business growth, Clive believes that strengthening the relationship between India and New Zealand is crucial. He is enthusiastic about acting as a conduit between the rapidly expanding second-generation Indian business community and the India New Zealand Business Council (INZBC). Through his efforts, he aims to help bolster the INZBC's membership and amplify its impact, fostering greater collaboration and economic growth between the two nations.
Michael Henstock
Christchurch Chapter Head
Michael brings a wealth of experience in stakeholder engagement and communication across both private and public sectors. His expertise spans a diverse array of organisations, enabling him to effectively navigate complex environments and foster meaningful connections.
He specialises in building and strengthening strategic partnerships between organisations and their key stakeholders, ensuring alignment and collaboration for long-term success.
Michael's career includes consulting and agency experience, significant roles in the Canterbury earthquake recovery efforts, as well as engagements with the New Zealand BLACKCAPS and Indian cricket teams, further showcasing his adaptability and leadership in high-stakes environments.
With a deep understanding of the political and business landscapes in Canterbury, Michael is politically astute and maintains strong relationships across iwi, industry, and government networks throughout New Zealand.
SANDEEP SHARMA
Strategy and Trade officer
Sandeep is a performance-driven international education leader with a proven track record in business strategy, stakeholder management, and institutional partnerships. Known for his expertise in market entry strategies, student mobility, and academic collaborations, Sandeep brings a strong analytical mindset and relationship-building skills to every initiative.
As CEO of Quality New Zealand Education Ltd, he transformed a startup with no clients into a prominent player, securing 1MN NZD in funding and developing strategic partnerships across New Zealand’s eight universities and 75+ Asia-Pacific international schools, valuing 20MN NZD. Sandeep has also fostered industry collaborations with Reliance, Alliance, TATA, and the University of Auckland, and earned equity in the company for his impactful contributions.
In his tenure with the University of Canterbury, Sandeep led successful student recruitment campaigns, market strategies, and international agent relations, enhancing the university’s global presence.
As Director of Sapna Refrigeration, he established a state-of-the-art HVAC manufacturing facility and secured partnerships with industry leaders like Videocon and Fläkt Woods, resulting in over 8MN USD in export contracts and ISO certification.
An active member of INZBC, Sandeep is dedicated to advancing its strategic mission of strengthening New Zealand-India business relations. He says, "I'm eager to contribute to INZBC's mission of fostering stronger business ties between New Zealand and India. Let's work together to build a brighter future for both nations."