Social impact entrepreneur, founder and business builder.

The Chaurasi Kutia ashram in Rishikesh — known worldwide as the Beatles Ashram — is where the Beatles stayed with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in 1968 and wrote much of the White Album. When the Maharishi's organisation was not awarded a continuation of the lease, the 22 acres of forest inside the Rajaji reserve stood silent and overgrown for four decades.

I was the first person to be granted permission to host the cultural event on that land again, and the first to host a cultural festival inside it. We reopened and re-initiated the temples, invited Mooji to hold satsang, and gave the crumbling meditation huts and halls back to artists as their canvas.

The Rishikesh Art & Film Festival ran for eleven days across six venues, with more than 50 artists and 30 volunteers. Filmmakers, photographers and musicians came together around one theme — the Sacred Life of India.

It was conceptualised and funded through sponsors, government grants and my own personal funds, and kept entirely free for local people and travellers alike. It was my service to India. After forty years, the place came alive again.