Sunita Viswanath,

Executive Director Emeritus

Founder and Strategic Advisor

  • Sunita has worked for over 30 years in women’s rights and human rights organizations. Sunita co-founded Hindus for Human Rights in June 2019.


    In 2001, Sunita co-founded the international women’s human rights organization, Women for Afghan Women (WAW), and served as Board Chair of WAW until January 2022. She has been an advisory board member to Unfreeze Afghanistan since its inception in September 2021, and cofounded Abaad: Afghan Women Forward in August 2022. Sunita has edited “Women for Afghan Women: Shattering Myths and Claiming the Future” (Palgrave McMillan, 2003), a book of essays. For her work with WAW, Sunita was awarded the Feminist Majority Foundation’s Global Women’s Rights Award in 2011.  Sunita co-founded Sadhana in 2011 in order to mobilize Hindu Americans to connect their faith to social justice and human rights, and serves on Sadhana’s Advisory Board.

    She was honored by President Obama at the White House in 2015 as a “Champion of Change” for her work with Sadhana. In 2021, Sunita was recognized by Center for American Progress as one of 21 “faith leaders to watch.”  Previously, Sunita worked with The Sister Fund and Funders Concerned About AIDS, as well as serving as a board member of Amnesty International-USA. She is an advisory board member of Population Media Center, which uses entertainment-education and mass media to promote social and cultural change.

    Sunita is a board member of Dalit Solidarity Forum. Sunita served on faith advisory committees during the tenures of both NYC Mayor Bill De Blasio and Mayor Eric Adams. Sunita lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Raju, Dec 2018, at the Vaanam Arts Festival in Chennai, organized by Dalit groups, and headlining the popular “Casteless Collective” band

Raju Rajagopal,

Founder and Strategic Advisor

  • Raju has spent over two decades working with Civil Society groups in India and has been active on a range of issues such as rural development, disaster management, governance and transparency, communal harmony, and human rights. He shares his time between Berkeley, CA and Chennai, India and writes on social causes. Prior to engaging with the non-profit sector, he spent over three decades in the corporate world, retiring as the Chief Operating Officer of a publicly traded healthcare company in the U.S.

Sunil Sakhalkar,

Co-Founder

  • Sunil is an architect, and an advocate for the environment, social justice and human rights. He has spent over 30 years practicing architecture in India, New York, Florida and New Mexico. As a passionate advocate of environment, his interest is in sustainable design and new building materials. Sunil serves on the board of One Door Campus for the Homeless and the St. Elizabeth Shelters in Sante Fe. Sunil is also part of the Mayor’s task force in addressing homelessness and affordable housing in Santa Fe.

    Having been brought up as a Hindu Brahmin in Mumbai, India, Sunil understands his privilege. However, living as a minority in the USA, he also understands the importance of equality and rights. He truly appreciates the responsibility and the opportunity it offers him, and the unique position it places him in addressing the social injustice and human rights in India. 

Punya Upadhyaya,

Co-Founder

  • Punya is deeply aware of the power of religion as the true source for transformation and renewal from years of being blessed by his Guru and spending time drinking chai at his Baba's ashram. He works in the areas of leadership and culture with Fortune 500 firms, Native American nations, NGOs, colleges etc. all around the world. His Bollywood song for the work of HfHR is Madhubala singing "jab pyaar kiya to darna kya" - and he looks forward to the power of beauty, music and the Gods and Goddesses to replenish our worlds.

Urmila Kutikkad

  • Urmila is a current graduate student at Harvard Divinity School with a thousand-pronged “focus” on grief, body, and ritual as they play out in the spheres of gender/sexuality, liberation theology, and South Asian studies. They are adamant about the beauty and necessity of individual and communal healing, and they believe Hindus for Human Rights is moving with grace and force towards this type of healing.

    Urmila’s favorite place to be is on the verandah of their ammamma’s home in Kozhikode during the monsoons, and they love the poet Carl Phillips.

Govind Archarya

  • Govind has spent two decades working in social justice and human rights, mostly centered in South Asia. Until recently, he was the India Country Specialist for Amnesty International USA in addition to having a couple of stints on their Board of Directors. He also has a passion for housing rights and advocates for safer and better pedestrian and cycling infrastructure. He works at the University of California, Davis.