C. V. Madhukar

C. V. Madhukar (born 1968) is an Indian public policy leader and impact investor. He is the Chief Executive Officer of Co-Develop, a global nonprofit fund that supports countries in building inclusive and equitable digital public infrastructure (DPI).^[1][2] He was previously an Investment Partner at the Omidyar Network, where he led the firm’s global work on digital identity.^[3]

C. V. Madhukar
Born	1968 (age 56–57) India
Occupation	Public policy research
Known for	PRS Legislative Research and Co-Develop

Education

Madhukar holds a Master in Public Administration (MPA) from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University,^[4] where he was an Edward S. Mason Fellow.^[3] He earned an MBA in Finance from the University of Houston and a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from Bangalore University.^[3]

Career

Madhukar began his career in 1993 as an investment banker with ICICI Securities and Finance Company in Mumbai, where he worked on the disinvestment of large public sector enterprises.^[5][6]

He contributed to the early growth of the education NGO Pratham and was part of its original executive group in Mumbai.^[7] In 2000, at the invitation of the Government of Karnataka, he co-founded and managed the Akshara Foundation, an education initiative in Bengaluru.^[8] Around the same time, he helped establish the Azim Premji Foundation, which supports the use of technology in rural schools.^[3]

Madhukar later worked at the World Bank in Washington, D.C., focusing on parliamentary capacity-building across emerging economies.^[9]

In 2005, he co-founded PRS Legislative Research, a nonpartisan institution that provides analysis of the work of the Parliament of India.^[10] PRS publishes legislative briefs on bills and provides nonpartisan research support to Members of Parliament.^[11]

Madhukar was later an Investment Partner and Managing Director at the Omidyar Network, where he led its global work on digital identity and digital public infrastructure.^[12][3] In this role, he also oversaw work on governance and citizen engagement in India and Myanmar.^[3]

Since 2022, Madhukar has served as CEO of Co-Develop. In this role, he works with governments, multilaterals, and philanthropies to help countries design and implement DPI systems such as digital identity, payment platforms, and data exchange systems.^[13] At the 2024 Global DPI Summit in Cairo, he called for more than 100 DPI implementations worldwide by 2025, describing the effort as “laying the plumbing” for digital transformation.^[14][15]

Fellowships and recognition

Madhukar is a Fellow of Echoing Green, Ashoka, and Eisenhower Fellowships.^[16][3] In 2008, he was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.^[17][18]