About Us
Transdisciplinary Research Foundation or TRF is a Section VIII non profit research focused organisation, and is an idea that has been constituted during one of the most exigent years in human history, the period of a pandemic, a period that reiterates the need for remaining invested in public health and a period, when humanity, yet again, is trying to circumvent a global health & economic crisis and is hoping to look at a bright future again.
TRF synergizes a multidisciplinary team of professionals with varying backgrounds through a common contrivance christened as ‘Research’ with an aim to solve local issues through innovative & social infrastructural solutions that would promote a self-sustainable ecosystem. We visualise an end beneficiary of the development sector eco-system as a ‘customer’; and this visual implicitly inflicts a sense of urgency & importance in conceptualising & delivering a development sector project.
Our organisation has been formed with passionate & dedicated people who are committed to bring change in the lives of the bottom of the pyramid. The same reflects in our interdisciplinary team of experts, an invigorating combination of bio-medical doctors, health policy professionals, education specialists, Integrative medicine & CAM specialists & communication/advocacy executives. All our services are aligned at alleviating poverty, improving health & education demographics & supporting private/public/civil society organisations to improve governance & program execution while working inclusively with the affected. Our approach is to work closely with key people inside and outside government who are involved in organising and delivering public services. We also work with funding agencies to develop practical and sustainable solutions to real problems. Our expertise and excellent network within public sector organisations allows us to share experience of public sector policy and practice with project partners. We draw on the advice and expertise of senior policy makers and managers, politicians and academics from all over the world who work with our clients to assist them in developing public sector policies, systems and structures appropriate to their needs within their respective environments.
We are accustomed with all stages of the development consultancy processes – preparation, design, implementation and evaluation, and the most suitable methodologies for bringing best practice to clients. We are sensitive to local needs and priorities and we understand the importance of working within the political and cultural environment in partner countries. We work extensively with local and regional consultants and organisations and are committed to sharing experience and developing local capacity.
Organisation Mission
We aim for equitable access to superlative healthcare & wellbeing for all Indians across all generations while espousing the dichotomies within Western biomedicine & indigenous systems of medicine.
Organisation Vision
To create & support accessible tools & innovative methodologies that would support an integrated approach to healthcare delivery in all institutional settings
Key Team Members
Ranju Anthony
Founder/Chief Executive
Mr. Ranju Anthony is a seasoned public health professional with an in-depth understanding & experience in converging private sector’s clinical efficiency with non profit’s ethical & sincere approach to social problem solving. He is the Founder Director of Transdisciplinary Research Foundation and is a methodical professional committed to humanitarian issues with more than 23 years of international practitioner-research experience in information technology and data management, public policy & health technology innovation focused on strengthening health systems in Asian/African regions. His expertise incorporates program management, developing partnerships & collaborative eco-systems, planning & monitoring public health projects, formative research on communicable diseases (especially vector borne & neglected tropical diseases), public procurement audits and advocacy & social communication for country-wide public health campaigns. He has led multi-country (internationally) & multi-state (in India) research projects focused on identifying operational inadequacies through the prism of socio-economic & operational bottlenecks of health systems & services in developing countries.
He has an extensive experience in design, management and conduct of international market research / nation-wide/ surveys among diverse stakeholders such as Government and government backed institutions, civil society organisations, think tanks, industrial enterprises, consumers etc. He has developed (business & philanthropic) strategies for public health projects funded by international donor agencies. He has travelled extensively during his professional stints spanning countries in Australasia, East Africa, South East Asia and South Asia.
His research interests include Public-Private-Partnerships in healthcare, integrative medicine, wider determinants of health & health inequalities, asset based approaches to improve community health & well being, qualitative / participative research approaches to evaluate public health focused programs & developing collaborations for building prototypes for scaling impact in the development sector.
Dr. Sukesh Trikha
National Consultant –Healthcare Projects
As a public health and healthcare delivery services management professional, Dr. Trikha, is endowed with accurate amalgamation of management techniques, public health wisdom and over two decades of experience in diverse organisations. He desires to drive in changes, so that world truly becomes healthy, while, partnering with people across diverse echelons and deploying innovation as per the context. He is a non-conformist; an administrator par excellence with scholastic bend of mind & his non-conformist approach to problems always lead to ‘out-of-box’ ideas.
Dr. Trikha has worked with the Indian Navy as a Director/Principal Medical Officer for over a decade, after which he joined the corporate sector with management stints with organisations, such as Sri Balaji Action Medical Institute, Advent Healthcare, Fortis Healthcare (all based in Delhi) & the Countryside Group in Hyderabad. His skill set includes strategic planning & marketing in healthcare and he has executed projects encompassing assessment of statutory & operational requirements of large multi-speciality hospitals, capacity development of healthcare workers in accordance with NABH standards, resource optimization projects including re-assessment of medical colleges on PPP mode, while heading medical services in reputed large private hospitals in NCR region.
Dr. Trikha is also an External Quality Assessor for Public Health Facilities as part of the National Health Mission, Government of India, since the year 2018. He is very easy to get along with and has this outstanding ability to win the respect of his peers as well as juniors when it comes to team work.
Saji M Kadavil
Senior Business Responsibility & Sustainability Specialist
Mr. Saji M Kadvail is a Senior Sustainability Specialist. His academic training and over 14 years of professional experience has earned him proficiency in developing corporate social responsibility as a business case and sustainable business across value chain in South and South East Asia. After obtaining MPhil in Applied Economics from Centre for Development Studies, affiliated to Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), he attained his PhD in Economics from JNU on the questions of contested space of livelihood, sustainability and environment of the marginalised in Kerala. He has worked closely with companies, NGOs and Government bodies on various sustainability programmes, fundraising and its operational implementation, engaging public-private partnership and advocacy programmes in different countries. He has initiated UTZ Tea Certification in India and Sri Lanka in the tea sector which covers certification of both the small tea growers and big estates. He has trained direct stakeholders on better working conditions based on ILO core conventions and basic rights of children; standard of living etc based on UTZ Tea Code in many estates and small growers groups in India and Sri Lanka. He has contributed many articles and compiled studies on CSR and value chain on South and South East Asia and his recent article titled ‘Social Cost and Labour Productivity: Situating UTZ Certification and Sustainable Business in Sri Lankan Tea Industry’ has been published in the latest issue of Journal of Labour and Development. In recess, he acquaints himself with world literature, photography, travelling, cooking and films.
Dr. Dinesh Kumar
Integrated Healthcare Specialist
Dr. Dinesh is a graduate in Indian System of Medicine i.e. BAMS (Bachelor of Ayurvedic Medicine and Surgery and is inclined towards concept of holistic health, traditional medicine and Yoga & Meditation for a healthy life. He has completed his post graduation in public health from TISS (Tata Institute of Social Sciences) Mumbai in health economics and health financing. He has worked with the Haryana Government as an Epidemiologist, and has been engaged in activities related to monitoring of various diseases, outbreak investigation and designing of protocols for mapping different infectious diseases. Later on, he worked as a state consultant for “Health Management Information System” with the National Health Mission Haryana. He has also been engaged in capacity building activities of healthcare workers like training of health related data management, development of composite indicators for chief minister’s dashboard, monitoring of various health program related data, development of protocols for various activities and supervising district and state level Monitoring & Evaluation Specialists. He has many scientific publications to his credit, including work like “Economic Burden of Dengue while during his epidemiologist tenure”, “Economic Burden of Diabetes Mellitus” and “Causes of Deaths in India” etc.
Our Advisors
Prabhat Kumar
Mentor
Mr. Prabhat Kumar leads Child Protection with Save the Children, India. With 18 years of experience in child rights in his roles leading Save the Children programmes in Rajasthan, Bihar, Punjab & Haryana states. He has dedicated practice of quality child rights and gender sensitive programme in field, building partnerships on child protection and gender, influencing policy changes and strengthening child protection systems in the country. As a passionate facilitator for embedding child safeguarding protocols in institutions he has supported several institutions and organization in making it safe for children.