Dr. Hanumappa Sudarshan is an Indian social worker and tribal rights activist. He is well known for his contributions to the upliftment of the forest dwelling tribes (mainly Soligas) in the Chamarajanagar district of Karnataka.

He is also a recipient of the Right Livelihood Award and the Padma Shri. Sudarshan was born in Yemalur on the outskirts of Bangalore. He graduated from Bangalore Medical College and became a medical doctor in the year 1973.

He is also an Adjunct Professor at IGNOU. In 1980, he started the Vivekananda Girijana Kalyana Kendra for the integrated development of the tribals in the Chamarajanagar district of Karnataka. He is also the founder and Honorary Secretary of the Karuna Trust.

One of the early DNBs in family medicine, teacher and trainer in family medicine over 40 years who built up the Family physicians association in Bangalore from a handful of members to over a thousand members at present. He ran numerous courses for Family Physicians over the years. He has been an examiner for both DNB and FCGP in the past.

He was honored to give the keynote address on the inaugural day of the national conference of family medicine FMPC 2018. Presently he serves as a mentor to the AFPI Karnataka chapter. He has published several articles and papers in both the lay and academic press and has been a columnist for a newspaper in the past, and edited a newsletter cum journal for FPA for over 25 years and till recently for AFPI Karnataka. His other non professional interests include sports (badminton and golf), music (classical Hindustani), reading and writing, bird watching, environmental concerns, ethics, visual arts (paintings) and being with young people. Link to his blog: https://badakerecrao.blogspot.com/ Can be contacted at: badakere.rao@gmail.com

Prior to Karuna Trust, Venkat joined Vivekananda Kendra, Kanyakumari as a full time worker. After initial training, he went to Arunachal Pradesh to be part of the Integrated Tribal Development programme.

He worked as the Secretary of the project at the time of leaving the organization in the year 1998. He then joined Dr. Sudarshan in Tribal and Rural Development organisations namely Vivekananda Girijana Kalyana Kendra (VGKK) and Karuna Trust.

Venkat has worked in different capacities in both organizations and became the Trustee of Karuna Trust in the year 2002. He has been Joint Secretary since 2010.

Shailendra (Shailey) Prasad, MD MPH is the Carlson Chair of Global Health and the Executive Director of the Center for Global Health and Social Responsibility at the University of Minnesota, Professor and Vice-Chair of Education at the Dept of Family Medicine and Community Health at the University of Minnesota, Adjunct Professor at the School of Public Health, and a Fellow at the Institute on the Environment at the University of Minnesota. He is also an honorary visiting professor at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and Udayana University, Denpasar, Indonesia. He has been inducted into the Academy of Excellence in the Scholarship of Education at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Prasad is the co-director of the Rothenberger Leadership Academy, a cohort based leadership training program at the University of Minnesota. He is the co-lead of the CDC funded National Resource Center for Refugees, Immigrants and Migrants (NRC RIM) and the NIH/Fogarty funded Northern Pacific Global Health consortium.

Dr. Prasad has worked in underserved areas for 3 decades as a clinician, has conducted health services research and has been engaged in education across disciplines. He is actively involved in the growth of academic primary care and global health research training across various parts of Africa, India, Thailand and South America. He has also been involved in academic department strengthening and mentorship training across various universities.

Can be contacted at: shailey@umn.edu