About Us

Jamshed K Daboo

Jamshed K Daboo, is a parent and an Independent Advisor in the consumer, retail and hospitality space. Working closely with the leadership team of start-ups, small and medium enterprises to help scale up operations with a clear focus on unit economics and path to profit. Partner at TenX2, an accelerator working with companies aligned to UN Sustainability Goals and Strategic Advisor with MergerDomo, a financial marketplace connecting start-ups and SMEs to key eco-system players. Mentor with Social Alfa.

Career with the Tata Group spanning nearly thirty-four years in the consumer, brand, hospitality and retail space. Over twenty years of experience in heading profit centers and businesses. Demonstrated skills in developing customer-centric strategies driven by a high level of focus around brand and the customer experience. Developed strong business models in businesses with a wide reach and network of outlets across geographies. Strong focus on growth and expansion. Senior mentor for the Tata Business Excellence program. Expertise in customer-focused strategies, strategic brand management, partner relationships and building organization alignment.

Jamshed is an alumni of XLRI, Jamshedpur.

Vahishtai J Daboo

Vahishtai J Daboo is a parent and a Listening and Spoken Language Specialist,
Certified Auditory Verbal Therapist from the Alexander Graham Bell Academy, USA.
She is also a Mental Health and Emotional Freedom Technique Practitioner. She is the Founder and Principal Consultant of INTEGRATED, a centre for Hearing,
Speech and Child Development for children and adults. She has been practising in the field for over 25 years.

Fatema Jagmaag

Fatema Jagmaag is an Audiologist and a Speech/Language Pathologist. She is the founder and Principal consultant of Shaba Speech and Hearing Centre in Mumbai – which offers the entire spectrum of audiology and speech/language services to children and adults and has more than 30 years of experience.

Her special interest is in candidacy selection and audiological management of Cochlear Implantation in children and adults.

She is a Senior Consulting Audiologist at Saifee hospital, Masina Hospital and Prince Aly Khan Hospital in Mumbai.

Fatema is the Co-Founder and Trustee of VConnect Foundation.

She is a parent of an adult with hearing loss.

Purvee Parekh

Purvee Parekh is a parent and a Trustee of VConnect Foundation. Purvee has been instrumental in initiating VConnect Foundation’s Mainstream Guide project which has been greatly successful. Through the project we have successfully launched mainstream guides in 4 different languages and conducted several workshops for parents and professionals to enable successful mainstreaming of children with hearing loss.

Purvee worked as a parent coordinator at K.D.N Shruti School for children with hearing loss for over 12 years.

Bapsy Patel

Bapsy Patel is currently heading Administration at Tata Realty and Infrastructure Limited. She has over 40 years of service to her credit across various roles like HR, Administration, Training, CSR, Employee Engagement and Environmental and Occupational Safety. She has sound volunteering experience having trained and mentored youth in the field of Career Readiness and Mental Health. She likes sharing stories, knowledge and life’s hacks with people and solves puzzles in her spare time.

Juliee Thakkar

Program Director, VConnect Foundation
As a parent of a 26-year-old cochlear implantee, Juliee brings both personal lived experience and professional depth to VConnect Foundation.
With a background as a Mental Health Director (Narrative Practices) and a Diploma in Mental Health (Narrative Practices) from Ummeed Child Development Centre, Juliee has also served as a facilitator for the Parent Peer Support Mental Health Training program — equipping other parents with the tools to support their families’ emotional wellbeing.
Rejoining the Foundation as Program Director, Juliee is driven by a deep commitment to ensuring no family walks this journey alone.

Behroze

Behroze is a parent of a 16 year old. Behroze is a B.Com graduate and has completed the ‘Parent Peer Support Mental Health Training’, an 8 month programme conducted by VConnect Foundation in collaboration with Ummeed Child development Center and is now a trained Mental Health Facilitator and uses this approach in her interactions with caregivers and the team.

Behroze has been working with VConnect in an honorary capacity since 2016. She is currently the Programme Coordinator for VConnect Foundation and manages the coordination and activities of VConnect Foundation. Apart from this, she coordinates for all the activities of our key area on Education for the various webinars being conducted for the Mainstream Guide. Behroze is a key member of our team who coordinates with the parents on all the different VConnect Circles on a daily basis.

Kashmira

Kashmira is the Administrator for VConnect and works towards coordinating with funding agencies.

She has worked for IHCL (the Taj Group of Hotels) as an Executive Secretary for VP Sales & Marketing, President, Taj International Hotels, COO Taj Leisure Hotels, Group Security Advisor, spanning over a period of 24 years.

Kashmira is the founder member of Doa Bakhshidan, a group of dedicated ladies raising funds to provide Medicaid, educational costs, provisions, etc. to the unfortunate and needy.

Vaishali Pendurkar

Vaishali Pendurkar has done her Bachelor’s in Arts in Psychology and several related courses like the Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT), the advanced course to name a few.

She joined Tupperware as Business consultant and then as Associate Sales Development Manager for the Western India region. She took care of the training needs for the region and conducted classroom and field training sessions to enhance sales opportunities with the Distributors. She managed the development, implementation, and continuous improvement of training programs in Mumbai as well as in outstation locations. She is currently working as a consultant to a trust to change the working of 4 clinics from manual to digital.

Vaishali has experience as a Hospital Administrator, where she set up the hospitals’ non-medical activities. Put in place procedures for billing and inventory management. Organised schedules for recruitment and training of staff and its implementation.

Jeroo Buhariwala

Jeroo Buhariwala is the Director of Buhariwalas International Relocations, a reputed firm in the relocations business. Jeroo has had an illustrious career in the Banking sector for over 24 years with the Banque Indosuez and Standard Chartered where she dealt with the various aspects of trade, cash management and treasury products.

Jeroo is actively involved with social causes and is a member of CRSA (Colaba Residents and Association) working for a beautiful and hawker free Colaba Causeway. Jeroo is on the Alumni committee J.B.Petit High School for Girls and is passionate about giving back to her alma mater what she gained from it in terms of strength, growth and confidence.

Rhia Marshall

“Rhia Marshall is a Partner, Dispute Resolution at Jerome Merchant + Partners. Rhia read law at ILS Law College, Pune.

Rhia has over a decade of experience in complex domestic and cross border disputes with a focus on arbitration. Rhia worked with Wadia Ghandy & Co. and Economic Laws Practice before joining Jerome Merchant + Partners.”

Mala Chadha

She is an Executive Committee Member of VConnect Foundation.

She has been associated with Ummeed Child Development Center for fifteen years. She has worked neurodivergent children for over three decades.

She claims to be a lifelong learner believes that it is the small things that add up.

Anisa Lalani

Ms Anisa Lalani is a Clinical Psychologist and Counsellor & Narrative Practitioner. She works at the department of psychiatry, NKP Salve Institute of Medical Science and Research Center and Lata Mangeshkar Hospital. She specializes in Psychometric Assessments and Analysis.

Rukshan Gotla

Ms.Rukshan has completed her Bachelor of Commerce. She has worked with Swissair for 5 years. She’s been a homemaker for the past 29 years moving around different countries. Rukshan loves helping people and has always wanted to give back to society. She has completed her course in Emotional Freedom Technique.

Navaz Master

Navaz Master has committed her career of over two decades, towards child centric issues, be it education, child rights and safety or ensuring they have a normal childhood of happy memories.

A graduate in psychology and a certified professional in strategic HR, she prefers to focus on underprivileged and children with disabilities, and their activities, to ensure they can ease into mainstream society.

The VConnect Foundation Team

Trustees

Vahishtai J Daboo

Fatema Jagmaag

Principal Advisor

Mr. Jamshed K Daboo

Legal Advisor

Rhia Marshall

Executive Committee Members

Bapsy Patel

Mala Chadha

Purvee Parekh

Chief Executive Officer

Navaz Master

Juliee Thakkar

Programme Coordinator

Rukshan Gotla

Behroze Billimoria

Administrator – Funding

Kashmira Surti

Administrator – Data

Vaishali Pendurkar

Mental Health Director

Anisa Lalani

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