Mr. Rakesh Gangwal (BT/ME/1975), an Indian-American businessman, is the co-founder of IndiGo airlines. He was the Chairman, President, and CEO of Worldspan from 2003-2007. Mr. Gangwal also served as the President and CEO of US Group Airways from 1998-2001. His long association with the airline industry began in 1980, when as an Associate of Booz Allen & Hamilton, Inc, he worked closely with United Airlines. After he joined United Airlines in 1984, he held a series of positions at United. Previously, Mr. Gangwal had been a financial analyst in the product development group of Ford Motor Co and a production and planning engineer with Philips India Ltd. After graduating from IITK, Mr. Gangwal earned his MBA from Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1979. Mr. Gangwal is the Distinguished Alumnus (2000) of IITK. In 1999, he was recognized by Business Week magazine as one of the 25 top global executives. Mr. Gangwal instituted the Champa Devi Gangwal Chair in honor of his mother.
Prof. Arun K Saha, Department of Mechanical Engineering, specializes in Experimental and Computational Fluid Dynamics & Heat Transfer. He focuses on the fundamental and applied aspects of jet and wakes, with an emphasis on pollution management and electronic cooling..He earned his PhD from the IIT Kanpur in 1999. He received the Best Paper (Heat Transfer Division) award by Internal Gas Turbine Institute of ASME, New York, 2006.