Our Team
Rishika is a Political Science and English undergraduate at Ashoka University and leads Young India Foundation as the CEO. She is motivated by bridging the gap between India’s vast youth population and their representation in India’s democratic institutions. She has been actively involved in various youth-centric initiatives, such as serving on the Youth Board of the Indian School of Leadership or working with Young Leaders for Active Citizenship—aiming to ensure that young people in the nation are adequately provided with platforms that build them into active political agents.
Parth Gaikwad
Technology Consultant
Shefali Gupta
Senior Program Manager
Shefali (she/her) started her journey with oppressed communities in Kutch as a freshly-graduated college student. After experiencing the stark contrasts across cultural, social and economic ecosystems around the country as a research fellow, she aims to understand and address gender disparities and under-representation in data and policy. She has been awarded the India Fellow Social Leadership Program, and has an undergraduate degree in Economics from Lady Shri Ram College for Women in Delhi, along with a micro master in Data and Economics from Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab.
Currently, she is a Senior Program Manager with Young India Foundation and handles operations for their #Why25 campaign, facilitating workshops and events bringing together students and other non-profit organisations in India towards a synchronised youth movement. She is also part of the Centre for Youth Policy, that analyses electoral data and disseminates it, creating pathways for young voters to engage with their democratic rights to vote.
Shefali Gupta
Senior Program Manager
Shubham Jain
Head of Creative
Shubham is a visual artist who actively looks to work with purpose-driven organisations and helps them assume their role as protagonists in building a desirable future, not only for corporate and social responsibility, but also to maintain their relevance to people using research, technology, and media.
At YIF, his role is to quickly sync and align multiple stakeholders on out-of-the-box and clutter-breaking ideas so the organisation can circle back to the campaign(s) at hand that will result in the exponential growth of the organisation.
Shubham Jain
Head of Creative
Sudhanshu Kaushik
Founder
Sudhanshu Kaushik is a MBA Civic Scholar of the Univeristy
of Chicago, graduate of the University of Oxford (MSc). and
New York University (BA) where he researched young people
and electoral politics. He is the founder of Young India
Foundation, a trust that works to increase youth political
participation.
Sudhanshu has previously worked with the Permanent Mission
of India to the United Nations and CNN with Fareed Zakaria.
He was named for two consecutive years on International
Literary Association's 30 Under - 30 list and Washington
Square Park's 2016 Up and Comers. He is also a recipient of
a fellowship from the South Asian Journalist Association and
the Gallatin Human Rights Fellowship. He is the author of
The Future is Ours, forthcoming by HarperCollins coming out
in late January, about the youth right’s movement in India
and the state of young people.
Sudhanshu Kaushik
Founder
Supriya Kumar
CYP Associate and Community builder
Supriya (she/her) has pursued her academic interests in the social sciences. Having completed her undergraduate degree in History from St. Stephen's College, University of Delhi, she went on to study Sociology in her Master's from Jawaharlal Nehru University. In the span of these five years, she has been actively engaging with socio-political questions regarding the rights of women, labour and youth within the sphere of the university. She has worked in academia and outside, as a researcher involving a range of intersecting subjects - public health; politics; law; religious minorities and gender.
Her motivation to work in the development sphere involves a commitment to social justice and progress, aiming to bridge gender, caste and class gaps in society.
She is also passionate about films and culture theory.
Supriya Kumar
Senior Program Manager
Rikit Shahi
Election Data Head
Rikit is a lawyer by qualification and works with a Delhi based law firm. Having graduated in 2022 with a dual degree in bachelor's in arts and law, he has been associated with YIF since 2020. At YIF, Rikit tracks and researches on elections. In the past, he was co-incharge of the Local Representatives Program. A little birdie has it that Rikit wanted to be a part of YIF since 2018 and his efforts materialised after sliding into the DMs of Sudhanshu Kaushik, the founder of YIF.
Rikit Shahi
Election Data Head
Mrinal Sharma
General Counsel
Mrinal Sharma is a lawyer and an intersectional feminist, currently based out of Mumbai. She graduated with a gold medal and distinction in business and law honours from Jindal Global Law School and with a masters in law from the University of Cambridge. She’s working extensively in M&A advisory and public policy with top law firms in India. She has a flair for fashion, fitness, travel, nature and mentoring young lawyers. In her free time, you will find her lending pro bono assistance to survivors of domestic violence, briefing counsels on custody battles and property matters. She’s thrilled to aid YIF with her expertise.
Mrinal Sharma
General Counsel
