About

Akshay pursued his higher education at the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay. During college, he played a leading role in several student organizations. He was the president of the newspaper and leader of the on campus mentorship program. Engaging with many students, Akshay had an opportunity to understand the challenges they were facing. In particular, he saw that those who came from the government schools didn’t have strong scientific foundations to keep up with the courses. While he felt that he needed to do something about this, he also felt compelled to contribute financially to his family for the years of hard work his parents put in. 

Upon graduation, Akshay joined the Boston Consultancy Group. In his first year, he was posted to a cement plant in a remote rural area. He quickly became accustomed to the place and in the evenings, he went to the village and visited the truck driver’s camp. The people were poor and every family depended on the plant. Akshay soon started to use his salary to provide business loans to the people in the village. He sat with them and helped them make business plans. Most of these loans were never returned, but it did not matter – he realized what it felt like to make a difference. Shortly after his return, Akshay felt restless and quit. 

Feeling uncertain of what he was supposed to do, Akshay attended Harvard Business School, where he remembered the conversations he had with his former classmates about supporting the children from low-income families in college. He wrote to a number of people in his IIT network and asked if any were still keen to do something. Two people responded, and one was Krishna, co-founder of Avanti. While Akshay was in the US trying to find resources for Avanti, Krishna and other alumni began creating a mentorship network. Finally, Avanti won $25,000 through a Stanford business plan competition (2010). Akshay offered Krishna the option to quit his consulting job and use the money to start operations. Taking an indefinite leave of absence from Harvard, Akshay returned to India to work full-time on Avanti.