our team

Vikrant is a visionary leader who embarked on a remarkable journey of social entrepreneurship, leaving behind a successful career as a software engineer in a leading bank in Nepal. In 2013, he took a bold step to establish Fightback, a groundbreaking social enterprise dedicated to reducing the risk of violence and harassment in Nepal.

As an entrepreneur, Vikrant has demonstrated exceptional skills in identifying and developing new markets to scale up the innovative training offered by Fightback. His strategic thinking and passion for empowering women and girls have been instrumental in the organization's success.

Recognizing the importance of education in creating lasting change, Vikrant also plays the role of an educator. He works tirelessly to integrate the Fightback program into the mainstream education system, ensuring that the program's benefits reach a wider audience. By promoting mental, vocal, and physical skills development, the program equips women and girls with the necessary tools to tackle the risks of violence and harassment.

Vikrant's dedication to building a society "free from the risk of violence and harassment" is further amplified by his role as a father to a daughter. His personal commitment to creating a safer environment for future generations drives him to push boundaries and challenge societal norms.

Under Vikrant's leadership, Fightback has made a significant impact. The organization has successfully trained over 35,000 women and girls across 30+ districts in Nepal. Additionally, Fightback has engaged more than 25,000 stakeholders, including men, boys, parents, and teachers, through comprehensive training programs. By involving multiple stakeholders, Vikrant ensures a holistic approach to addressing the issue of violence and harassment.

Vikrant's influence extends beyond Nepal's borders, as he has been invited to prestigious international seminars and events. Notably, he participated in a panel discussion titled "Business as a bridge to girls' empowerment: what does it take?" hosted by Palladium International in London in October 2018. His insights and experiences were also shared at the Social Capital Market 2018, the world's largest social entrepreneurship summit held in San Francisco. Moreover, Vikrant served as a keynote speaker at a workshop organized by USAID in Washington, D.C., in April 2019, emphasizing the application of design thinking for development impact. His expertise was further recognized when he joined a panel discussion on Women at the Deliver Summit organized by UNICEF in Vancouver, Canada, in June 2019. Most recently, in July 2022, Vikrant was a distinguished speaker at the United Nations High-level Political Forum on sustainable development (HLPF) held in New York.

As a testament to his exemplary work, Fightback has garnered numerous international awards, reflecting the organization's remarkable achievements and the impact it has made on individuals and communities. Vikrant's unwavering commitment, innovative approach, and inspiring leadership have established Fightback as a leading force in tackling violence and harassment, while also shaping the discourse around women's empowerment and social entrepreneurship.

Ms. Nepal is an ACCA member and holds BSc. Honors in Applied Accounting from Oxford Brookes  University, UK. She has also passed CPA (US) and CISA exams. She has accumulated more than 10 years  of experience in various sectors including non-profits, private, public and multilateral – in Nepal and  USA. Her experience ranges from business and strategy development, statutory and intern audit,  organizational financial management to public financial management. She is currently Governance and  Public Financial Management Advisor in DFID Nepal and is also a member of ACCA's advisory committee  in Nepal.

Ms Rana started her career in banking by working in customer service department of Nepal Investment  Bank in 2003. After 3 years of experience and outstanding performance in CSD she was transferred to  marketing deposit where she has been working for the past 13 years as a relationship manager. During  this tenure she has been awarded twice for bringing the top deposit. Her cumulative deposit portfolio  has been USD 8.9 million and she handles the most important and high profile accounts of the bank. She  recently took the 40 credit hours train the trainer self-defense course of ESD Global in New York.

Amita. Sen was born in Nepal but grew up around the world as she came from a background of family  diplomats. She has been living in the UK since 1983 and completed all her higher studies in London  University. In the 1980's she worked for the BBC Nepali section world service as an audio  correspondent and freelanced as an immigration translator for the London metropolitan police . 

She has been in the field of special educational needs for over 25 years and has taught students and  trained teachers in the UK , India and Nepal. During her career as an educationist she has created  policy in special needs and won a UK local award for improving the educational possibilities for  children with special needs. 

She has worked in several London schools as a special needs coordinator and introduced many  innovative strategies to overcome special needs difficulties in children.  

Although, trained as a dyslexia specialist , Mrs Sen has vast experience in a wide range of special  needs conditions such as autism, down syndrome, dyscalculia, global learning and speech and  language difficulties . She has also initiated several programmes for Gifted and Talented children. As  a special needs specialist she has the qualification of diagnosing in the area of special needs . 

Besides being a passionate special needs educator she has a passion for environmental education and  has dedicated two decades tirelessly in developing awareness of environmental and conservation  education between students of UK and Nepal. 

In 1989 she was instrumental in initiating environmental education planning in schools in Nepal with  the support of Environmental education ministry and the Nepal Trust For nature conservation  formally known as the King Mahendra Trust for Nature conservation. As a result she was given the  honour of being the first Nepalese to be a trustee of the UK Committee of the Nepal Trust for Nature  Conservation.  

Amita is a versitile educationalist who is also a honorary consultant to schools in India and Nepal. 

She is currently the head of personalised learning at Dwight School London , a post she took up since  2016.

Mr. thapa has an experience of 21 years and is one of the most experienced martial artist with a wide interdisciplinary skillsets in Nepal. He is responsible for designing the entire reality based self defence system of Fightback. He has one of the most varied and interdisciplinary skills set in self-defense and combative martial arts. He is accredited to being the head instructor in Nepal for Krav Maga (IKMF); Shin-Shin-Kan 3rd Degree Black Belt, 4th Degree Black Belt and president of WUMA Wushu Association Nepal; Kickboxing instructor, Shotokan Karate Black Belt.

Lori Dobeus is the founding principal of Advancing Inclusion. She is an experienced coach and facilitator with 25 years’ experience in diversity. Lori works with leaders to measure and increase the diversity of the talent pool, to design and roll out unconscious bias training for managers, and to improve governance for Employee Resource Group, among other projects.

In her early career, Lori founded The Women's Safety Project, as US-based non-profit organisation that provided safety training and rape prevention education to women and girls.

Wade Channell, J.D. is a recognized international development expert, with 30 years of experience working with and for the U.S. Agency for international Development in the fields of economic growth, business development, rule of law and gender equality.  Before retirement in 2021, Mr. Channell served as the Senior Economic Growth Advisor for Gender, and was technical lead for the U.S. Government's Women's Global Development and Prosperity Initiative (W-GDP).  Since retirement in 2021, he has continued to provide consulting services in the area of women's empowerment, and serves a board member for several non-governmental working with women and men to promote gender equality.

Meena Sharma has over 17 years of experience in the human rights, peacebuilding, governance, leadership and gender fields, from planning, program/partnership management, to implementation of leadership, women and youth programs at community, civil society and leadership levels. She worked as a Program Manager- Leadership and Governance in Search For Common Ground, since 2008 to 2017. She is currently working with World Bank Group's supported project, "The Integrated Platform for Gender Based Violence Prevention and Response in Nepal" implemented by the National Women’s Commission.

Dr. Suraj Shakya is currently working as an assistant professor and clinical psychologist at TU Teaching Hospital, Maharajgunj. He has completed his master’s degree in psychology in 2005 and MPhil in clinical psychology in 2012 from the same university. He developed a parent reporting questionnaire for the assessment of the emotional and behavioral problems of Nepalese children and adolescents as a part of his doctoral research. He has a research interest in community mental health and psychometrics.

He holds an international diplomate as a certified cognitive behavior therapist from the Academy of Cognitive & Behavior Therapies (USA). He practices individual sessions at the TU teaching hospital and other mental health centers in Kathmandu. In addition, he provides online psychotherapy services for adolescents and adult clients, as well as clinical supervision to counselors.

Karuna has experience of nearly three decades working in the field of development in Nepal and other developing countries. Her last assignment was with Foreign Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO)/British Embassy Kathmandu (BEK) (earlier known as Department of International Development) from 2012-2022. She worked in the position of Social Development Advisor and served as the technical lead for gender and inclusion, social norms, human trafficking/modern slavery and safeguarding against sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment. She worked extensively on Integrated Program for Strengthening Security and Justice funded by FCDO throughout the design, implementation, monitoring evaluation and closing stages.

Karuna holds a PhD in Social Psychology. Prior to joining FCDO, she worked at CARE Nepal, Academy for Education Development (Nepal. India, Vietnam and Afghanistan), and Johns Hopkins University/Population Communication Services (Nepal) in various capacity.

Karuna currently is working as a freelance development consultant. Her recent assignments were for UN Women Nepal (Kathmandu) and Swiss National Research Foundation (Geneva) and Rural Health Education Services Trust (Nepal). Currently, she has a short term assignment with the World Bank Nepal office beginning June, 2023.

Karuna is technically strong on multiple social development areas. She has experience and expertise on women’s empowerment/leadership, gender equality and social inclusion security and justice, modern slavery/human trafficking/migration, social protection, social norms, gender-based violence against women, sexual reproductive health/nutrition, policy analysis, safeguarding against sexual exploitation, abuse, harassment. She brings experience of adaptive programming (COVID context), research, preparedness and response activities during humanitarian crisis. She has excellent communication skills and strong network with government and non-government organizations/networks in Nepal.

Karuna currently sits on the board of Nepal Public Health Foundation, Global/Nepal Water Partnership and GREAT International. She is a member of the Network of Nepalese Psychologists. 

Anita has a PhD in Human and Natural Resource Studies from University of Zurich and Kathmandu University. She has completed a 4-years post-doc at the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research North-South project at the University of Bern, Switzerland. Her PhD is on the livelihoods of people displaced by the Maoist conflict in Nepal while her post-doc is on knowledge and skills circulation among Nepali and Pakistani student who returned after education abroad.

She is the director of Nepal Institute for Social and Environmental Research and course instructor for Masters degree course on migration and social inclusion at Purbanchal University, College of Development Studies. Her research expertise are on social norms, youth and adolescents, poverty, migration, and social protection. Since the last 10 years, she has been working in multi-year and multi-country research commissioned by DFID- UK, UNICEF, IOM, USAID and World Bank among others.
She had published edited books, book chapters, papers in journals, took kits and policy briefs and reports. Her research partnerships are with international think tanks and universities such as Overseas Development Institute-UK, Palladium-UK, Development Pathways-UK, The Bassiouni Group- USA, University of Sussex, and University of Wolverhampton.

Her current works are building evidence gap map for adolescent in low and middle income countries (https://www.unicef-irc.org/evidence-gap-map/) and a 10-years research on adolescents (Gender and Adolescence: Global Evidence: https://www.gage.odi.org/) including those working in adult entertainment sectors.

Arman Raj Pandey is the Program Head and soft skill trainer of Fightback. He has 7 years of expertise in safety training. Holds a Master's degree in Economics and possesses strong communication and management skills. Extensive background includes training and collaborating with diverse groups, such as adolescents, visually impaired individuals, individuals with disabilities, corporate professionals, refugees, and marginalized communities in over 25 districts of Nepal.

Mr. Dinesh Dhital holds a B.Com from Delhi, India's Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), and is a semi-qualified chartered accountant. He spent three years as an audit assistant in several manufacturing sectors centered in Delhi NCR, working under the supervision of a charter accountant, and he spent one year as an assistant manager in the microfinance industry.

Ms. Pooja Gurung is a fightback self-defense instructor. She has 2nd-degree black belt in Wado-Ryu Karate. She has refereed and participated in various national tournaments.  She has completed her Bachelors In Business Studies and has the experience of training 20,000+ trainees in the fightBack program. She is currently doing her post graduation in counseling psychology.

Ms. Mamta Jayprakash Singh is from Nawalparasi and holds a bachelor's degree in major English. Her hobbies are traveling, reading books listening music .She believes reading books is important as it creates understanding and improves comprehension.

She believes in team work and has worked as VP lady Jaycee Ram gram and as an active member of AATMA RAKSHA KISHORI SAMUHA. She has conducted training programs at various schools and places through this samuha.

Bhawana is a “Soft Skill Trainer” at FightBack. Prior to joining FightBack, she worked as a Project Coordinator in Creative Skills Pvt. Ltd. For 5 years. Bhawana holds a Bachelors Degree in Humanities from Tribhuvan University.

Ms Sirjana Adhikari has completed Master's degree in Rural Development. She is interested in travelling and interacting with new people wherever she gets the chance to. As she has completed her studies in rural development she is interested in helping people and doing social work. She has received training in anchoring.

She is the soft skill trainer of Fight back. She had completed master degree in management. She has experience of working in various NGO and INGO.

Neha is a soft skill trainer at FightBack. During her Bachelor's Degree, she entered the Leadership world and took part in the programs of various organizations to explore her passion for creating impact in people's life and serving humanity. As for her recent experience, she was part of an organization Women Leaders in Technology that empowered young girls to be the leader.

Pratikshya Pokharel is a soft skill trainer with excellent interpersonal skills with proven ability to work effectively with team spirit and in a multicultural environment and function as and effective team member in various groups. She graduated in Masters in Counseling Psychology from Tribhuwan University. She is also a lecturer of Psychology and life coach practitioner.

Tina is aspires to work as a soft skill trainer in Fightback in the rural areas of Nepal. She is a Social Work graduate and currently pursuing her Advance degree in MA Psychology. She has professionally been involved with organizations that work for Children and SRHR advocacy.

Melina Lama is pursuing master’s degree from central department of psychology, kirtipur. She is interested in travelling, listening music, and exploring new activities.

Zenisha Panta is a soft skill trainer. She has completed her Bachelor’s in Social Work. She has more than two years of experience as an intern in NGO like VIN (Volunteer Initiative Nepal) and as a volunteer in INGO like Raleigh International Nepal.

Rabina is a Fightback Self Defense Trainer. She has a black belt 1st Dan in Shito Ryu Karate. She has participated in many national tournaments. She is a student and enrolled in High School. She enjoys watching movies, dancing and going on long rides.

Puman is pursuing a Bachelor's degree in Management while working as a self-defense instructor at FightBack. She holds a diploma in WUSHU.

Sabina is pursuing a Bachelor's degree in Management while working as a self-defense instructor at FightBack. She is 1st Dan Black Belt holder in Shitoryu Karate.

Bachan is a Fightback Self Defense Trainer. She has participated and refereed in many tournaments and teaches Taekwondo to the youth. She holds black belt 2nd Dan in Taekwondo.  Her hobbies include reading books and watching movies.

Roshani Theeng is a black belt 2nd Dan holder in Taekwando. With six years of experience in Taekwando, she has also participated in national tournaments as well. She loves watching sports and singing.

Santu Maya Tamang is our Fightback Self Defense Trainer pursuing further education in the management field. Taekwondo Black belt 1st Dan holder Santu Maya Tamang had played national tournaments as well. Her interests lies in cooking and singing.

Nirmala is a Fightback Self Defense Trainer. She has over 15 years of experience in Martial Arts and holds a black belt 2nd, Dan, in Shito- Ryu Karate. She is also an instructor of Shito Ryu Karate. She has participated in many national and international tournaments. She has secured 1st in many tournaments such as 1st National Inter Dojo Karate championship 2064 B.S, Kathmandu, 2nd open zone Republic sports karate championship 2064 B.S, Kavre, 3rd SAARC all styles open karate championship 2008, Delhi, India, and 1st International Rounder championship 2013, Kathmandu, Nepal

Surendra Thapa Magar is a Diploma holder in Wushu Kung Fu Guan. He has also participated in many National and International Tournaments. He is currently doing bachelors in BSW field. He loves to play football, sing and travel.

Aswin Kumar Chadhary is a Diploma holder in Wushu Kung Fu Guan. He has also participated in many National and International Tournaments. He has done his +2 in humanities field and is currently active in martial arts too. He loves to workout, travel and watch movies.

Santosh is a Diploma holder in Wushu Kung Fu Guan. He has done his +2 in management field. He has also participated in many National and International Tournaments. He loves to do photo shoots, play sports and play guitar.

Aakriti Subedi, is a final year law enthusiast who has keen interest in Humanitarian law and Criminal law. She is someone with a great zeal to learn and expand the horizon of her knowledge. Similarly, she is a very dedicated, hardworking person with excellent time management and researching skills. Most importantly, she is a kind, loving compassionate person who believes in helping others

Shreya Malla is currently pursuing her Masters in Business Administration at Ace Institute of Management. Shreya has always been passionate in the field of academics. She firmly believes that the effects of technology and media content on development and learning is massive and hence, education system must continuously be modified to meet opportunities and challenges in this rapidly changing world. In addition to developing the online educational curriculum as a content writer at Fightback, she also helps with designing curriculum for a private Montessori.

For the past 5 years, Shreya has spent working in the research and teaching department with few organizations. On working with Fightback, Shreya mentions that she was unaware about how harassment could take multiple forms and had major implications

on the lives of people. The learnings and research made her choose to conduct her current research titled, “Impact of workplace harassment on intention to leave: a mediating role of psychological stress”. Shreya further adds that working with Fightback and developing ILO content has indeed been a valuable and an eye-opening experience.

Ms Monika is an MBA graduate with specialization in Human Resource Management from Limkokwing University of Creative Technology. She has prior experience in sales and marketing, research and development. She is an enthusiastic person with a learning attitude and strives for excellent performance. Her core interest is in research and innovative sustainable work.