Dr Vanita Sharma

Dr. Vanita Sharma is an Advisor on Strategic Initiatives and a member of the leadership team at Reliance Foundation in India. She helps conceptualize and develop new programmes and strategic partnerships, with a key focus on education and women’s empowerment. Over the past six years, she has supported the foundation in developing strategy and programmes across areas such as early childhood, foundational literacy and numeracy, edtech, scholarships, women’s entrepreneurship, and digital inclusion. She also contributes to strategy for communications, thought leadership, and research initiatives, including the development of platforms such as India Day at UNGA and the Building Flourishing Futures conference on early childhood in India.

She has over 20 years of international experience in the social sector, corporate social responsibility, and communications across the UK, South Asia, and Africa, working with corporates, academia, and charitable foundations. Previously, she worked at Tata Trusts in Mumbai as Head of Policy and Advocacy for the cancer care programme; as Head of Communications and CSR for Tata Consultancy Services’ UK subsidiary Diligenta in London; and as Head of Programmes for AfrOx at the University of Oxford.

Dr. Sharma holds a BA, M.St., and D.Phil. in History from the University of Oxford, where her research focused on South Asia. She has taught history at the University of Oxford, the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), London, and the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), Pakistan. She was awarded a Scholar of Peace Fellowship by the Dalai Lama Foundation.