Harish Hande

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Harish Hande was born and raised in Orissa, India. After completing his basic schooling in Orissa, he went to IIT Kharagpur for his undergraduate studies in Energy Engineering. He then went to the U.S. to do his Master’s and later PhD. in Energy Engineering at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell^[1]

Harish Hande co-founded SELCO Solar Light Pvt. Ltd. , the first rural solar service company in India. With its headquarters in Bangalore , SELCO has 25 branches in Karnataka and Gujarat. Today SELCO INDIA has over 75,000 installations in the rural areas of these states.

Harish Hande has won the Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy 2005 and Tech Museum Award 2005. Harish has also received the world’s leading green energy award from Hon. Hillary Benn, the British Secretary of State. In 2007 SELCO INDIA won the Outstanding Achievement Award from Ashden Awards. The award was presented by Al Gore, former Vice President of the United States of America. Harish Hande was named the Social Entrepreneur of the Year 2007 by the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship and the Nand & Jeet Khemka Foundation. He was also the featured attendee and speaker at the Clinton Global Initiative 2007.

Recently Harish Hande was chosen by Business Today as one of the 21 young leaders for India’s 21st century.