People

Ms. Daksha Shah is a renowned figure in the microfinance sector with over 22 years of experience in this field. She is an individual driven with the zeal to work for and amidst people to bring around a change in their daily living conditions. Touched by the poverty prevailing in society, she was inspired to take a path that could impact lives and bring about a change in the society.

Ms. Shah has been associated with several renowned institutions. She was a part of Friends of Women’s World Banking (FWWB) for a period of 12 years. She assessed about 80 organisations and conducted capacity building programs, and helped transform NGOs into companies in partnership with SIDBI. Ms. Shah served as the credit head of FWWB. She also worked with Vikas Centre for Development for a period of 3 years for developing and building the microfinance programme.

As founder promoter, Ms. Shah started Pahal Financial Services Pvt. Ltd., an NBFC-MFI, and served as its Managing Director for 6 years. Ms. Shah’s passion to contribute towards women empowerment can be witnessed in her commitment in working with and promoting growing institutions dedicated to the development of women below the poverty line and with low income households. Ms. Shah has performed appraisals for over 70 institutions in her career and she continues to support emerging MFIs to streamline their business model.

Mr. V. Swarup

Promoter Director

Mr. V. Swarup is the key visionary of Altura Financial. His passion to contribute his experience, learnings and findings during his association with several institutions involved with social upliftment programs, NGOs and MFIs has driven him to institutionalize Altura to transform the lives of the underprivileged. He has been involved in the microfinance sector for over 20 years contributing towards capacity building initiatives, training modules for financial inclusion, and research on the changing patterns in the microfinance sector. He has been an advisor for microfinance institutions to enable them to connect their business model with their field operations to increase their efficiency at performing on par with the industry.

Mr. Swarup is a graduate in social work and has extensive experience in the field of social economic development with a deep understanding of NGOs in credit and shelter related services. He served as the Chief of Community development, HUDCO and as the Director of Habitat Polytech, which works with NGOs/MFIs for housing for the poor. He was the Chief Community Development Officer at Madras Metropolitan Development Authority and Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board involving in the planning of settlement layouts based on the felt needs and life styles of the beneficiary groups in the slums identified under the project. Mr. Swarup also served as the Project Director of Urban Community Development funded by UNICEF in addition to being an Advisor with DHAN, International Network for Alternative Financial Institutions (INAFI) and Micro-credit Consulting Group. He participated in various workshops and trainings conducted by BIRD, SIDBI, Gramin Bank and Micro Credit Summit.