11 Young Global Leaders from India

11. Chhavi Rajawat

She is India's youngest and the only MBA to become a village head, a position often held by elders. She quit her senior management position with Bharti-Tele Ventures of Airtel Group to serve as the sarpanch of Soda, a village 60 kilometers from Jaipur. Chhavi Rajawat is an alumnus of Rishi Valley School in Andhra Pradesh, Mayo College Girls' School, Ajmer; Lady Shri Ram College, University of Delhi and a management graduate from Pune. “In the past year alone, I and the villagers in Soda have brought about a radical change in the village purely through our own efforts. We have had no outside support - no NGO help, no public, nor private sector help," she spoke at a United Nations conference. "In three years I will transform my village. I don't want money. I want people and organisations to adopt projects in my village as often projects fail owing to lack of a local connect and that is what I am here to provide by bridging that gap,” she said last year.