Global
Leadership Team

Nisaba Godrej is the Executive Chairperson of Godrej Consumer Products Limited. She has been a key architect of GCPL's strategy and transformation for almost two decades.

She is also the Chairperson of Teach for India and sits on the board of Godrej Agrovet, Bharti Airtel, and Mahindra and Mahindra. She has a BSc degree from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Nisaba is passionate about education, the human mind, trekking and equestrian sports. She lives in Mumbai with her children Zoran and Aidan.

Sudhir Sitapati is the Managing Director and CEO of Godrej Consumer Products Limited (GCPL). GCPL is one of India’s largest consumer goods multinationals with a presence in over 85 countries and serving 1.2 billion consumers. Sudhir is responsible for guiding the purpose and ambition of the company; to bring the goodness of health and beauty to consumers in emerging markets.

Prior to this, Sudhir worked at Unilever for 22 years where he led teams across several categories and functions in India, Europe, South East Asia, and Africa. His last job was as an Executive Director - Foods and Refreshments at Hindustan Unilever.

He is current Co-chair of the CII FMCG Committee and a past Co-chair of the CII National Committee of Food Processing. Sudhir was awarded the ‘Young Alumni Achiever’ by his alma mater, the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, in 2017. He is also the author of the best-selling book 'The CEO Factory: Management lessons from Hindustan Unilever'.

Sudhir has an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and a B.Sc. in Math with Economics Honours from St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai. Sudhir is married to Ketki and spends his free time trying to get his children, Sahaana and Kabir, interested in his own hobbies — tennis, Hindustani music, farming and scrabble. So far to not much avail

Aasif Malbari is the Chief Financial Officer of Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

In his last role, he was the Chief Financial Officer at Tata Passenger Electric Mobility Limited and Director at Tata Motors Passenger Vehicles Limited. He was an integral part of the leadership team at Tata Motors since joining in 2018. Prior to that, he worked at Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL).

During his tenure at Tata Motors, the Passenger Vehicle India business scaled ~5 times in a short span of three years to reach its highest-ever revenue of ~INR 50,000 crore, witnessing significant financial turnaround. He led the reorganisation of the business into two new legal entities and subsequently, a USD 1 billion fundraise in the Electric Vehicle Business at a valuation of ~USD 9.1 billion. Aasif also played a key role in various other projects, including the acquisition of Ford India’s manufacturing plant, significantly increasing the capacity at an optimised spend.

Over his 23-year long career, Aasif has worked in roles ranging from Accounting, Business partnering, Buying, Planning and Logistics, Controllership, Treasury, Investor Relations to Group Performance Management, which have provided him with great experience in varied FMCG categories in India and across the globe.

Aasif loves building personal bonds with his colleagues and teams and has, over the years, led large teams in Asia, Africa, China, Middle East and Europe. He has set up various new financial verticals with a clear mission and mandate of enhancing business partnering, leading to sustained profitable growth.

Aasif graduated from Sydenham College, University of Mumbai, and is a Chartered Account and Company Secretary and secured the All India First Rank in both the CA intermediate and final examinations.

His wife, Fatema, is an Occupational Therapist, and they have two children, Zahra and Ali. Aasif enjoys traveling, especially road trips with his family. On a free day, he enjoys taking long walks or trying out new restaurants with his close friends and family.

José Toscano is Business Head, Latin America, Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

He has over 20 years of experience and has worked at leading FMCG companies such as IBM, The Clorox Company, Cepas Group and General Mills. Before joining Godrej, he worked with General Mills for 10 years as Managing Director for the company’s Argentina business.

At Godrej, José has worked across the marketing and sales functions in senior leadership roles and has transformed the business by drawing the focus on consumers, brand development and company culture.

José joined Godrej Argentina as Sales Director in August 2018 and played an important role in the design of a new commercial route-to-market strategy, among other things. Since then, he has taken on higher levels of responsibility, first as Commercial Director and now as Business Head, where he has been instrumental in building a culture of innovation, fostering international expansion and boosting process efficiency.

As Business Head, he has led the transformation of the Latin America business through the democratization of personal care consumption, delighting consumers with our range of brands.

José has a Master’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and a Post Graduate degree in Negotiations from Austral University.

Rajesh Sethuraman is Business Head - ASEAN, Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

Rajesh has 26 years of work experience, the majority of which he has spent at Unilever, leading teams across categories and divisions in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa to deliver significant value for the business. He has also worked at Crompton Greaves and Heinz India.

In his last role, Rajesh led the execution of Unilever’s largest digital transformation programme across Asia, Africa and the Middle East; enhancing customer experience, while delivering a simplified, agile, and cost-efficient organisation. The programme future-proofed the company’s core operations through the end-to-end reimagination of processes, technology, and organisation design. It aimed to deliver significant improvement to the bottom-line growth ambition, and enable a focus on growth.

Rajesh has previously led the company’s largest division in Africa – Home Care, and driven a significant portfolio turnaround. The business, which had witnessed a multi-year decline of turnover and profitability, saw a turnaround under his leadership, and delivered sustained top-line growth and margin expansion across several African markets.

Prior to this, Rajesh led the South Asia Laundry brand development agenda, with his team successfully delivering Hindustan Unilever’s biggest innovation of the decade, Surf Excel Easy wash.

Rajesh has an MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur and a Bachelor of Engineering from Coimbatore Institute of Technology. His wife, Shanti, is a keen painter, and they love to travel, especially across the African Savannah. One of their most vivid memories is of admiring the Milky Way galaxy, the rings of Saturn and the moons of Jupiter, under the pitch-black night sky of Sutherland, Africa’s coldest town. Currently, they have their hands full raising two little boys, Rayaan and Yohan, besides being pet parents to their cats, Mia and Loki.

Vijay Kannan is Head of Business Transformation and Digital, Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

He has over 19 years of work experience in the Consumer Goods and Energy industries with multinational organisations like Shell and Unilever, leading multi-disciplinary teams to deliver significant business results and superior customer and consumer experiences.

Vijay was previously the Global Chief Information and Digital Officer of the Global Lubricants business of Shell, a global market leader that operates in over 100 countries. He was instrumental in building digital ecosystems to transform customer engagement, and route-to-market capabilities and innovations around new digital native business models by unlocking the power of data and data intelligence. He was also responsible for the broader B2B customer transformation at Shell. He delivered a market leading e-commerce platform for Shell’s customers, and enriched the customer service experience through seamless omnichannel engagement capabilities to improve supply chain transparency. He has also had past experience as Hindustan Unilever's IT Head, and prior to that with Asian Paints.

Vijay has an MBA from IIM Lucknow and a Bachelor of Engineering from College of Engineering Guindy, Chennai.

Vaibhav is the Global Human Resources Head of Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

Since joining us, 14 years ago, he has worked in various HR leadership roles in India, Indonesia and Africa, and in his most recent role, he served as the CEO of our Southern Africa business.

Vaibhav loves making deep, meaningful connections and believes that building an organisation-first culture creates space for everyone to learn, thrive and grow. Through his career at Godrej, he has led with empathy and trust and has helped grow and transform several teams and businesses across geographies.

He completed his Engineering Degree from the University of Mumbai and he also has an MBA from the Institute of Management Technology (IMT), Ghaziabad.

His wife, Gurnandan, is a home maker, and they have two children, Gurnoor and Veer. Vaibhav loves playing board games with family and friends, and, on a free day, he enjoys long walks with his wife and movie nights with his children.

Divya Narayana Murthy is Head - Legal, Godrej Consumer Products Limited; Group Head - Legal, Godrej Industries Group.

Divya Narayana Murthy has 20 years of Group-level experience at Reliance Industries Limited. As Vice President - Corporate Legal and M&A, her central leadership role required her to work closely with the Group’s management team, and partner with business and legal heads across sectors (oil and gas, refining, petrochemicals, retail, brands, telecommunications, digital and technology, and new energy).

She has been responsible for leading the Group’s major transactions, including investments, joint ventures, and debt management cum fundraising. This has offered her unique opportunities and insights, both as a legal professional and a manager. Some of the salient transactions that she has worked on, include the restructuring of the telecom business, followed by negotiating investments in the tower and fibre infrastructure businesses with private equity investors, the petro-retail joint venture with BP plc, and Reliance’s foray into ‘green energy’ across the globe.

Through her career, Divya has been instrumental in shaping and evolving the in-house Legal function at the central and business levels, in framing internal legal risk policies, and selecting and nurturing relationships with external stakeholders in Indian and international law firms.

In line with her commitment to building more diverse and inclusive workplaces, Divya has accepted Board memberships at Just Dial Limited and Reliance Clothing India Private Limited, and internal POSH committee membership at Karkinos Healthcare Private Limited (a healthcare platform).

Divya enjoys competitive half-marathons, trekking, and travelling. She completed her schooling in Chennai and has a BA LLB Honours degree from the National Law School of India University, Bangalore.

Venkateswara Rao Yadlapalli is Head - Research & Development, Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

Venkat joined GCPL in 2014 as a member of the R&D team, where he was responsible for leading product development across categories. Since then, he has led the R&D function for the India and SAARC business and spearheaded global product development across geographies.

Venkat believes that developing ‘disruptive innovations’ is a way of life at GCPL. He has been instrumental in applying this thinking to create some of our biggest innovations, including mr. magic (the world’s first powder-to-liquid hand wash), the Goodknight Naturals household insecticides range, Goodknight Gold Flash (India’s most powerful liquid vapouriser), and Goodknight Power Shots (a no gas aerosol format) in Africa. He has also led the development and execution of the Godrej Professional hair colour range in India. Additionally, Venkat works closely with our Manufacturing and Supply Chain teams, helping to set up best-in-class manufacturing facilities and facilitating cost-saving initiatives and process improvements.

Prior to joining GCPL, Venkat was the R&D Head at Wipro Consumer Care, where he successfully led product development for leading brands like Santoor, Yardley, Chandrika, Safe Wash, Glucovita, etc. He also worked closely with Wipro’s South East Asia team during and post UNZA Holding’s merger with Wipro. Before that, Venkat worked with Dabur as a Principal Scientist and was involved in product development of the brand’s proprietary ayurvedic products, fermentation process improvements and intellectual property rights.

Venkat has a Master’s in Pharmacy from Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, and a Post Graduate diploma in Intellectual Property Rights from Amity Law School, Delhi. He was awarded a gold medal for topping his university during his Master’s degree; and, has, during his career, also received several patents across categories.

Venkat is married to Ramalakshmi, who has a Post Graduate degree in Mathematics, and they have two children Shruthi and Sreekar. In his free time, Venkat enjoys playing sport.

Darshan is the Global Design Head of Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

She is a creative impact strategist with a mindset for business transformation and a heart set on innovation. She founded the GCPL Design Lab in 2009, which has been a catalyst in bringing design- driven thinking to GCPL. The lab has led to the transformation of brands, across Personal Care, Hair Care and Home Care, keeping in mind the rapidly evolving Indian market.

Darshan and her team of highly skilled graphic and product designers are taking this approach to GCPL's global brands across Africa and Indonesia, too. Over the years, they have reimagined the role of design within the company by envisioning possibilities, fostering new skills and nurturing a design culture to create future-ready products that deliver superior experiences to consumers.

She completed her postgraduate studies in Lifestyle Product Design from the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad. She is an alumna of Harvard Business School, where she pursued her executive education in General Management. She also holds a diploma in Indian Aesthetics.

Darshan believes in inclusive design principles and the ideology that good design should be accessible. She is also an educator, passionate about cultivating and empowering young design leaders in India.

Harshdeep Chhabra is the Global Media Head of Godrej Consumer Products Limited.

Prior to this, he was Senior Vice President at Mindshare (GroupM, WPP), where he successfully led numerous high-profile advertising campaigns for some of India’s most esteemed brands, enhancing their visibility and market share.

Through his career, Harshdeep has held various roles in account management, media planning, media procurement, media analytics, advertising sales, marketing and investor relations, and has worked at companies including Zee Entertainment, Turner International and Radio City.

Harshdeep’s proficiency extends beyond traditional advertising. He has a profound understanding of consumer behaviour which enables him to develop innovative and impactful marketing strategies. Additionally, he also strongly believes in the role of data and technology in crafting successful campaigns.

He is an alumnus of St. Joseph’s Arts and Science College, Bangalore University, where he graduated with Honors. He also holds a Postgraduate Degree in Management Studies from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai.

His wife Aditti is a dedicated homemaker and they have a teenage daughter, Niharika. In his down time, Harshdeep enjoys playing lawn and table tennis, listening to rock music, taking road trips with his family, and discovering new destinations.