SHRI RAKESH BHARTI MITTAL

Chairman

Rakesh Bharti Mittal is the Vice-Chairman of Bharti Enterprises, one of India’s leading business groups with interests in Telecom Services, Telecom Infrastructure & Devices, Space Communications, Financial Services, Processed Foods, Real Estate and Hospitality. He is the Chairman of Del Monte Foods and Bharti AXA Life Insurance. He is also a Non-Executive Director - Bharti Airtel and Managing Director - Bharti Land Limited.

Bharti Airtel, the flagship company of Bharti Enterprises, is a global telecommunications company with operations in 17 countries and ranks amongst the top three mobile operators globally. One of the largest integrated telecom providers in India and Africa, Bharti Airtel serves over 497 million customers across its operations.

Rakesh served as the President of CII for the year 2018-19. He is the Co-Chair of the India-Uzbekistan Business Council. Rakesh is also a member of the India-UK CEO Forum, CII Australia-India Business Champions, India-Japan Business Leaders’ Forum and the India-Pakistan Joint Business Forum. He is a Member of the Governing Board at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) and a Life Member of Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER). He is a Member of the Founding Circle of Centre for Social and Economic Progress.

A passionate advocate for quality education, Rakesh is actively engaged in enhancing school and higher education through multiple roles. He is a member of the Board at the Indian School of Business (ISB), Chairman of the ISB Mohali Campus Advisory Board and Chairman of the Advisory Council of the Bharti Institute of Public Policy. Additionally, he is a Member of the Board of Trustees and the Governing Body Member at Plaksha University. Rakesh is the Co-Chairman of the Advisory Board of Bharti School of Telecommunication Technology & Management at IIT Delhi. He is a Member of the All India Board of Studies for Post-Graduate Education & Research in Engineering & Technology (AIB-PGERT).

The group’s philanthropic arm, Bharti Foundation operates 173 Satya Bharti Schools and also supports 800+ government schools under the Quality Support Program (QSP) to ensure holistic education, reaching out to 3.4 lakhs students across 14 states. Since inception, over 7.3 lakh underprivileged children in rural India have benefitted from programmes run by Bharti Foundation.

Rakesh has been awarded the Honorary Doctorate of Civil Law by Newcastle University, UK. He has served as the Honorary Consul for the Republic of Sierra Leone in India from 2014 to 2020. He is a recipient of the prestigious ‘Horasis – Indian Business Leader of the Year 2016 Award’ and ‘Institute of Engineers Award 2004’. He has received the ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’ from S.C.D. College, Ludhiana and was recognized as a Distinguished Alumni of J.C. Bose University of Science & Technology, YMCA, Faridabad.