Bobby Ramakant

“My hope for a more just world lies in the belief that since a large majority of people are suffering injustices and inequities propelled by transnational corporations, the day is not far when people power will strike collectively and dismantle corporate power,” says Bobby.

Belief in people power and commitment to justice and equity have fueled Bobby’s work for decades. He has been involved with Corporate Accountability for nearly 20 years. In 1999, he joined the steering committee of the Network for Accountability of Tobacco Transnationals (NATT). He brings a breadth and depth of international campaigning, organizing, and media experience to the board. An activist and organizer with Asha Parivar — part of National Alliance of People’s Movements — in India since the early 1990s, he has campaigned to challenge the abuses of Big Tobacco, Coca-Cola, and Pepsi, and has organized for the right to food, nuclear disarmament, and peace. These campaigns, he says, provided him the “learning (and unlearning) curve to realize not only the similarity in tactics corporations use to do business with scant regard to human rights and justice, but also how our democracy is compromised, hurting the interest of large part of our population.”

Bobby is the director for policy and communications at Citizen News Service (CNS), where he writes extensively on tobacco control, health policy, and development. In 2008, he received the World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General’s World No Tobacco Day Award. And, after 17 years, he has gotten back on a bicycle, having sold his car with a determination to cycle, walk, or take public transport as much as possible in order to, as he puts it, “walk the talk.”