Managing Director
Mr. H S Dikkumbura – The founder of the Ceylon Sugar Industries & Holdings (Pvt) Ltd., is a professionally qualified Senior Planter/Tea Taster and 8 years of experience in Sugar Industry as Chief Executive Officer.
- Participated as a Speaker at International Sugar Conference – National Sugar Institute of India – October 2023
- International Award “Outstanding Leader ship in Fostering International Managing Director/CEO Award –2023” from Bharatiya Sugar – Pune India – February 2024.
Director – Sugar Processing Technology
Mr Ashok C. Pithawalla serves as Director of Sugar Processing Technology for Ceylon Sugar Industries & Holdings (Pvt) Ltd. He is an Indian Citizen Passport holder involved in international trading and a well-experienced qualified Mechanical Engineer, and he has good knowledge of the Sugar processing technology industry.
Mr. Ashok Pithawalla is presently working as a President of ACKM Pithawalla and Ashok Pithawalla & Co., Ashok Pithawalla Bob Jashmin Ltd.-Kuwait, ACKM Power Engineering PTE Ltd. from 1988 till up to date. Their main activities include business development and construction management services for power plants and chemical plants. Refineries and fertilizer plants for various overseas companies, and also, he is a Partner and worked as Operations Director of Pithawalla Engineering GmbH: Dusseldorf, West Germany, from 1972 to 1992.
Director/Consultant:
Dr A P Keerthipala – An Economist (Ex-Director/Chief Executive Officer of the Sugarcane Research Institute from 2013 to 2019) with nearly 30 years of experience in sugarcane field).
He has been a Fellow of the Society for Sugar Research and Promotion (SSRP) in India from 2014 and was a member of the International Society of Sugarcane Technologists from 1995 to 2019. In addition, he has served as a member of the Senior Scientists forum of the National Science and Technology Commission (NASTEC) from 1999 to 2019 and a member of the committee of Socio-Economists and Policy analysts in the Council for Agriculture Research Policy (CARP) from 1998 to 2001 and from 2013 to 2019.
He is a recipient of the presidential award in 2013 for scientific publications in 2007 and a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019 of the Society for Sugar Research and Promotion in recognition of contributions to sugarcane research and the sugar industry
Director Operation:
Dr A Wijesuriya – A Sugarcane Breeder (Ex-Director/Chief Executive Officer of the Sugarcane Research Institute from 2019 to 2020) with more than 30 years of experience in sugarcane breeding and agronomy.
He has received the following awards/patents:
- Award for the best paper in the session Genetics, Plant Breeding and Tissue Culture – 5th Annual Congress of Postgraduate Institute of Agriculture – 1993
- Award in recognition of the lifetime contribution to the Research and Development in the Sugarcane Sector – 2014
- Award for the best paper in the Sugarcane Sector – 6th Symposium on Plantation Crop Research – 2016.”
- L.A.G. Alwis, P.A.C.P. Wickramaratne, K.T. Ariyawansha, & Aruna Wijesuriya (2017) Blow Pollinator for Sugarcane – Patent No. 19520
- National Awards for Excellence in Agricultural Research – the best research in the plantation sector – 2021by SLCARP
OUR ADVISORY BOARD
Professor Narendra Mohan (Ex-Director of the National Sugar Institute, Kanpur, India) and Professor Prakash Lakshmanan (Professor and Director of the Sugarcane Research Institute, Guangxi Academy of Agricultural Sciences, China are serving as advisors to the Ceylon Sugar Industries and Holdings (Pvt) Ltd. They are professionally high calibre personalities in the industry. CSIH wishes to obtain their services for accruing a high level of professionalism in technical aspects of sugarcane agriculture, sugar, and by-product technology, and production of sugar-based value-added products, research, and development in cane farming, processing, and product development, etc. to achieve the targets of the company more efficiently and in an eco-friendly manner:
Professor Narendra Mohan:
- Adviser Sugarcane Processing Technology & Development – CSIH
- Member of the Processing Technical Committee – CSIH
Prof. Nadendra Mohan with a PhD in Sugar Technology and over 40 years of experience in the sugar industry has been an inspiring teacher, admirable research worker, and an esteemed government official with a long and distinguished career working in the sugar industry and at the National Sugar Institute, India. He has been an internationally-renowned research scientist and an academic in sugar technology as indicated by his publication of 7 books, more than 150 papers in various reputed journals, and many book chapters, and obtaining patents to his credit in addition to the presentation of many research papers and delivering lectures during the conventions, congresses, workshops, and seminars organized by ISSCT, IAPSIT, STAI, DSTA, SISSTA & other international organizations. He has obtained the following patents during the last ten years:
- Process for “Electrolytic Clarification of cane juice”.
- Development of a process for “Production of Sulphur-less sugar using carbon-di-oxide from distillery fermenters”.
- Development of “Electro-coagulation Process” for purification of wastewater.
- Method for “Determination of phosphate in cane juice” by a novel method.
- Production of “Graphene oxide” from the by-product of sugar factory.
- Technology for production of “Bio-methane & Bio-CNG from filter cake.
- Production of “Surfactants from bagasse”.
- Production of “Fortified amorphous sugar through co-crystallization”.
- Production of “Silica nano particles from sugarcane bagasse ash”.
Professor Prakash Lakshmanan:
- Adviser Sugarcane Agriculture Technology & Development.- CSIH
- Member of the Sugarcane Agriculture Technical Committee – CSIH
Professor Prakash Lakshmanan (Professor and Director of the Sugarcane Research Institute, Guangxi Academy of Agricultural Sciences, 172 East Daxue Road, Nanning 530007, Guangxi, China; Professor at the Interdisciplinary Research Centre for Agriculture Green Development in Yangtze River Basin College of, Southwest. 2 Tiansheng Road, Beibei district 400715, Chongqing, China and Honorary Professor at the QAAFI, The University of Queensland St Lucia, Brisbane, Australia)
Dr Prakash Lakshmanan is an internationally recognised crop scientist with over 40 years of experience in combined teaching, research, and research management in commercial, academic, and industry R&D institutions. He has been a recipient of multiple awards for R&D excellence from the Australian and Chinese Governments, the Australian Academy of Sciences and the Australian and Chinese sugar industry. He has 26 years of sugarcane research, academic supervision, and R&D management experience at senior levels in the Australian sugar industry, and 6 years of sugarcane research, academic supervision, and R&D institutional leadership in the Chinese sugar industry and an Agricultural science and technology leader with a highly developed understanding of the global sugar industry, sugar industry R&D, and close linkages with international sugarcane and other crop research and academic institutions. He has experience in developing and commercialising sugarcane technologies in Australia, China, and Indonesia, developing large multi-national joint venture projects with DuPont, Syngenta, and Dow AgriSciences, R&D business strategies, and managing multi-disciplinary and multi-institutional R&D portfolio and collaborations with institutions including multinationals.