Vijay Mahajan

Vijay Mahajan(born 11 October 1954) is an Indian social entrepreneur and the Founder and CEO of the BASIX Social Enterprise Group [www.basixindia.com] engaged in livelihood promotion of low income households in over 20 states in India and six developing countries. He is the President of MicroFinance Institutions Network (MFIN) of India www.mfinindia.org

Vijay Mahajan was born in Pune, India in 1954. His early education was in neighbourhood schools, but in the last four years, he was sent to the Jesuit St Xavier's School, Jaipur, where he learnt to speak English first time at the age of 12. He did well in the final school board examination in 1970 and appeared in the All India Merit List. Though selected as a National Science Talent Scholar and admitted to the St Stephens' College, Delhi University to study Physics, under family "guidance", he joined the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi in 1970 for a five-year bachelor's degree in technology, specialising in Electrical Engineering. He won a merit scholarship all five years at IIT and excelled in academics in his final years at the IIT. The IIT was also the place where Mahajan discovered and nurtured his love for public affairs, development and the arts and literature.

In 1979, he went to attend the post-graduate program in management (MBA) at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, from where he graduated in 1981, with a gold medal for scholastic performance. Though admitted to the Kennedy School of Government in 1981, he could not join due to inadequate financial aid. Many year later, he was selected as a Mid Career Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University in 1989.

Vijay's first job was at the electronics multinational company Philips in a marketing position. He worked there for four years, mostly in the Northeastern and Eastern India. His work took him to several industrial project locations in the hinterland where he encountered visible poverty. This fuelled the early interest in rural development and poverty alleviation he had developed while still at the IIT Delhi. Having heard of the Jawaja Rural University Project launched by the founder and former Director of IIMA, Prof Ravi J. Matthai and Prof Ranjit Gupta, Vijay decided to study at the IIM Ahmedabad. Two years of study and working with them made up Vijay's mind that he would like to work in rural economic development full-time and he has been doing that since 1981. After graduating from IIMA, he joined Dr NCB Nath, a visiting professor at IIMA, and carried out studies for the Government of India on the rural woollen handloom industry and on the effect of technology choice on mining communities. But Vijay left this after a year as he was keen to work at the grassroots and not as a consultant.

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