Rakesh Thukral named Managing Director, Edelman India

Edelman India today announced that Rakesh Thukral has been named Managing Director, effective immediately. In this role, Thukral, currently Chief Operating Officer, will lead the firm’s second largest market in the firm’s Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa (APACMEA) region.

Overseeing 400 people across 11 cities in India, Thukral will work with the Edelman leadership team to build on the success and continued strong growth that the firm has experienced in recent years. He will report to Robert Holdheim, CEO, South Asia, Middle East & Africa (SAMEA).

“Rakesh is well-positioned to drive Edelman India into its next phase of business growth,” said Holdheim. “He is a talented, seasoned leader and has a strong team to support him. It gives me tremendous pleasure to hand over the baton to Rakesh, at a time when we are at the cusp of exploring a dynamic new world of communications. I am confident that under Rakesh’s leadership, we will scale new heights and achieve new milestones for our teams, our clients and our business.”

An industry veteran with over 23 years of experience in Communications and Public Affairs, Thukral joined Edelman India in 2010 to set up the firm’s Public Affairs & Advocacy Practice. In 2012, he took on the additional role of Chief Operating Officer. During his four-plus years at Edelman, Thukral successfully built the Public Affairs practice to one of the largest in the country. He was a core member of the leadership team responsible for growing the business, developing new offerings and thereby expanding the firm’s presence to 11 cities.

 “In the last few years, Edelman has established a remarkable footprint in India and created a new benchmark in the PR consulting business. I look forward to working with our leadership team to leverage the scale, expertise and the new thinking to drive success for our clients and our business, said Thukral.

Prior to joining Edelman, Rakesh was the COO of Comma Consulting for over four years, a company that he helped set up. He also worked at IPAN, now known as IPAN Hill+Knowlton, for 14 years.

The last one month has seen several movements in the PR business. While Girish Huria, former COO of Avian Media has moved to lead communications at eBay India, Deepa Thomas quit eBay India to take over as General Manager, Group Communications at Mahindra and Mahindra. Valerie Pinto has also quit as CEO of Perfect Relations, leaving Perfect Relations founders, Dilip Cherian and Bobby Kewalramani to become hands on CEOs.