Ashok Natarajan, CEO, Steady-Taps Consulting (OPC) Pvt Ltd
A recognised leader in the water, energy and sustainable development sectors, Ashok has 40+ years of experience designing and implementing transformative solutions. He has led impressive projects and programmes in his long career in the areas of water metering, desalination, wastewater treatment, industrial water supply and urban water infrastructure.
For the past 3 years he has been a special Invitee and mentor for Central Public Health and Environmental Engineering Organisation under Ministry of Housing and Urban affairs , Govt of India, and National task force member to disseminate knowledge to all States and help in the implementation of water projects covering 500 AMRUT states / ULBs under the Government of India flagship program the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban transformation ( 40 Bn USD investment ) and played a major role as mentor and author for some of the chapters of the new water manual just published.
Before starting Steady-Taps, he was the CEO of Tamil Nadu Water Investment Company (TWIC) wherein he was instrumental in converting this Special Purpose Vehicle company of Tamil Nadu Government into diversified and solvent company. Earlier he was in leadership roles at leading organisations including United Phosphorus Ltd, Hydro-Comp Enterprises, Integra Software Ltd, Secure Meters Ltd, WIPRO and Crompton & Greaves.
- Management Committee member in the International Water Association water loss specialist group
- Domain expert in the central government scheme Uchhatar Avishkar Yojana (UAY) in the areas of waste water treatment, solid waste and air pollution for the last 4 years
- Domain Expert Group “Deployment of Water Technologies” – CSIR Ministry of Science & Technology, Govt. of India, New Delhi.
- Involved extensively with Niti Aayog the past two years in the areas of water recycling and water reuse workshops and brainstorming of new initiatives.
- Part of SWAN forum a leading voice on smart water networks worldwide and attending the annual conference at Vancouver in May 2024
- Research advisory board member, ICCW, IIT Madras
- Invited expert member, Taskforce member, editorial committee member of Ministry of Housing and Urban affairs, Govt of India. Was the author of many chapters of the new CPHEEO guideline including co -author of Automation, metering and Management chapters
- Designed and implemented under funding of WB capacity building program for TN ULBs certification program in areas of Hydraulic modeling, DMA designs and management of NRW with practical hands on training at Maynilad Philippines ( 5 batches of 30 nos engineers per batch between 2016 to 2019 )
Publications
Co-authored a book on water Scarcity and Ways To Reduce The Impact , published by Springer Worldwide
Authored two international publications published worldwide on Implementation Challenges for New Projects and Technologies
Our Team
Senior Consulatant
Dr Sanjay Dahasahasra, Former Member Secretary Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran (MJP) has put in 35 years of deep experience in mapping and analyzing Maharashtra’s water resources from river basin / sub basin to the water supply line of dams, rivers, canals, water bodies, storage reservoirs, urban, rural population, using advanced GIS, relational data base management and water balance encompassing urban, rural population, agriculture use , livestock , industrial etc . He had published a book Integrated water source management for Maharashtra which is used for planning, development, and management of water resources with neatly drawn shape files covering 5 major river basins, 62,621 micro water sheds and 1531 watersheds. Is presently the chairman of water and waste water manual being published by Ministry of Housing and urban affairs for last 2 years and presently about to be circulated to all states and ULBs for their guidance on water , waste water and policy needs aspect for government water utilities on behalf of Ministry of housing and Urban affairs . He is a PHD in water treatment and has high competence in modelling techniques using GIS . Her has won several international awards . MOHUA have published the following manuals authoured by him
- Advisory Note, ”GIS mapping of Water Supply and Sewerage Infrastructure” available at web site of Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA).
- Guidelines for Planning, Design and Implementation of Urban Water Supply Schemes towards Equity, Quality and Sustainability with a Road Map for 24×7, which is under finalization
- Guidelines for Planning, Designing, Implementation and O&M of Regional Water supply Schemes Covering Schemes for few Villages, many Villages, Peri Urban Villages and Enroute Villages of Urban
Consultant Finance / PPP
Srikanth has over 40 years of experience as a finance professional. His experience includes investment banking, managing the financing of the first greenfield water and wastewater public private partnership project in Asia (in Tirupur, Tamil Nadu) and consulting in the area of infrastructure financing. Srikanth is now involved with Asian Development Bank as a consultant.
Srikanth has been involved in several pioneering initiatives in the field of field of leasing and public private partnership projects, including the water and wastewater project on PPP basis in Tirupur, where he managed the funds mobilisation for the project and was also involved in the implementation of the project in a time bound manner.
Since 2008, Srikanth has been a consultant with a number of multilateral institutions and government agencies, involved in the implementation of projects in various sectors including water and wastewater, urban transport and energy, including transmission, distribution and renewable energy. Apart from India, Srikanth has executed consulting assignments in Bhutan, Bangladesh and Philippines.
Education Qualification: B.Com., PGDM (IIM Ahmedabad), AICWA
Consultant
Education:
- Master of Technology M Tech (Environmental Engineering)
- Bachelor of Engineering (civil)
Consultant to New Tiruppur Area Development Corporation limited.,Tiruppur
Preparation of detailed design for sewer collection system including zoning and hydraulic design, pumping stations and pumping mains including preparation of hydraulic and process sheets for Sewage Treatment Plants of including preparation of detailed hydraulic designs, structural designs ,drawings ,detailed estimates and tender documents .
Review of the proposed design and redesigning the sewer collection network as per the revised levels and revised alignment proposed of UGSS
Preparation of detailed design for sewer collection system including zoning and hydraulic design, pumping stations and pumping mains including preparation of hydraulic and process sheets for Sewage Treatment Plants hydraulic designs, structural designs ,drawings and detailed estimates
Partner Fox & Mandal legal consultant for Concession contracts
Ryas & Rajagopalan CA to Steady Taps
Advisory associates for Steady-Taps
23 years of experience in economic and social research, putting in place systems for governance and decision-making, Last 13 years in conceiving, designing and managing information and communications technology projects for natural resource management, research, governance, monitoring, evaluation & learning in varied sectors including urban development, rural development, industrial clusters, water & sanitation, environment & climate change and financial inclusion.
- Well versed with financial and regulatory reporting to governments, donors and achieve project targets with effective managerial control
- Hands on experience in projects related to sustainable development with strengths to network among governance practitioners, thought leaders and research communities as well as grassroots level participants; have conceived and managed participative development programmes
- Leadership role in project conception, delivery, team management with resources cutting across different domains
- Mentorship to start-ups and small-scale industries, with specific focus on value chain
Educational Qualifications
- Post Graduate Diploma in Financial Management
1996 – 1999 Institute of Financial Management and Research (IFMR) Chennai
- M A – Econometrics
1994 – 1996 University of Madras, Chennai, Tamil Nadu
Specialisations: International economics and Applied econometrics.
- Bachelor of Arts, Economics
1991 – 1994 Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning, Prashanthi Nilayam, Andhra Pradesh
- Currently pursuing PhD on “Information Systems for Environmental Management”
Since 2018, Department of Environmental Sciences and Management, Bharathidasan University
Advisory associates for Steady-Taps
Ph.D. Environmental Sciences, Bharathiar University, Coimbatore, India (2006)
Defence Research and Development Organisation Junior Research Fellowship
SPECIALISATION: Public health, Environmental Exposure Assessment using Spatial Statistics and GIS and RS tools, Environmental factors for disease occurrence and transmission through GIS/RS techniques, Image Processing analysis, Spatial Statistical modeling involved in Epidemiological Analysis in particular vector borne and infectious diseases.
GIS Analysis for Air and Water quality;
GIS-based regional estimates
Waste Management and Biomining, Solid Waste management – Environmental and Health Impacts; Vehicular Emissions and related disorders
Advisory associates for Steady-Taps
Ph.D Environmental Management, Bharathidasan University, Trichy
Software: ArcGIS, QGIS, RStudio, Google Earth Engine,Programming Languages: R, Python, BI Tools: Power BI, Tableau
RESEARCH INTERESTS:
- GeoAI and spatial statistics
- Environmental epidemiology
- Data Science – Natural Language Processing, Social Network Analysis
- Urban Analytics
- Data Analtics consultant for STEADY-TAPS
Financial Modelling Expert