Brief Bio of Abhimanyu Singh

Mr Singh had his schooling at the Mayo College, Ajmer from 1958-68.

He graduated with Honours in History from St.Stephen's College, Delhi in 1971 and attained the first rank in Master's in History from Delhi University in 1973.

He joined the premier Indian Administrative Service (IAS) in 1974 and was assigned to the State of Rajasthan.

He spent a year as a Hubert H.Humphrey Fellow under the Fulbright Program at Pittsburgh University, USA for mid-career professional development (1986-87).

On deputation to the Government of India, Mr. Singh worked for a decade at the Ministry of Human Resource Development in the Department of Education first as Director of Higher Education (1987-92) and then as Joint Secretary, Elementary Education (1995-2000). He represented India on the Board of Governors of the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) Vancouver, for three years.

Mr Singh returned to Rajasthan from 1992-95 to serve as Education Secretary when he lead and coordinated mass literacy campaigns and community based rural education projects ( Shiksha Karmi & Lok Jumbish) resulting in significant improvements in adult literacy and primary education in the State.

In recognition of his contributions to education in India, he was invited to chair the Global Drafting Committee at the World Education Forum at Dakar in 2000.

He joined UNESCO in April 2001 and was responsible for leading and coordinating the Education for All (EFA) movement on behalf of the international development partners for over five years.

Mr Singh was assigned as Director of UNESCO's office in Nigeria in 2006 and as Director of the UNESCO office in Beijing in 2008 where he is the first Indian to have held the position of a Head of a UN agency. His responsibilities extended to five countries - China, Japan, South Korea, Mongolia and North Korea.

On completion of his service with UNESCO in December 2014, Mr. Singh returned to India and was invited by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) to be Team Leader of four joint review missions to review the flagship programmes on Education For All ( Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan) and Mid-Day Meals in schools.

He was awarded a research fellowship at the University of Tokyo by the Japan Foundation to study Education for All (EFA) in 2016.

Mr Singh is now an international consultant to UNESCO. He recently drafted the SAARC Framework for Education 2030.

In May 2016 he was invited to Chair the Foundation for Education and Development, Jaipur ( Rajasthan) which is responsible for implementing the Doosra Dashak Project, one of the largest and most successful initiatives for education of adolescents in India