Alumni Spotlight: Ranganayukulu Bodavala
Ranganayakulu Bodavala “Ranga” holds an MBA and a PhD in information systems, and was a Takemi Fellow at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health first in 1999-2000 and a second time in 2021-22. Ranga started his career at the Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad and worked for a decade in public health systems across Africa and Asia including Afghanistan. Ranga was motivated to work with solar power and subsequently founded organizations, designed, developed and mass-produced various portable and ultra-portable lights for children, mothers, homes and streets of rural areas across the world.
Ranga’s present interest and projects are developing solar-powered pest traps for organic agriculture, indoor growth LED lights for polyhouses and electronic mosquito jammers that (he hopes) disable mosquitos (his second Takemi program project).
Ranga works at the Gharda Foundation, Mumbai as a Chief Mentor and CEO of the Hoshang Patel Tech Centre, Lavel. He hails from a rural agricultural family, and is interested in simple technologies that make the life of women and children better, safe and productive. We asked him about his time as a Takemi Fellow.
What was your experience during the fellowship?
The ability and freedom to meet, interact, attend, listen, collaborate and even organise events with wonderful professors, and practitioners, all in a very flexible time frame, process and in the most feasible way.
What was the most valuable takeaway for you?
Relationships I built (or they showered on me) that lasted 3 decades for research, consulting and leadership roles. The feeling that even after 3 decades, I have someone to reach out to for guidance on my professional work sparing across subjects and fields of knowledge and practice.
What would you advise others who are interested?
You can do what you want to do in one year without the limitation of courses, fees, subjects of focus. The program gives you the enormous flexibility, choice and motivation to do at your own pace without an academic load or targets.