MAM
Fareed Jawad is VP and principal product architect at Freecharge
New Delhi: Fareed Jawad has been appointed the principal product architect and vice president (VP) payments at digital payments platform Freecharge. In his new role, Fareed’s mandate will be to build payments technologies at Freecharge. Additionally, he will lead the efforts on building technologies for solving the unique payments problems in India.
Freecharge is on a mission to build the world-class payments ecosystem for merchants and customers. The company seeks to work collaboratively with various innovators and emerging FinTech players to implement the most reliable and frictionless payment method and Fareed will be instrumental in driving this with the senior leadership team at Freecharge.
Prior to his appointment at Freecharge, Fareed most recently served as principal product architect at Amazon India, where he was responsible for building the core payment processing infrastructure for the organization. Before joining Amazon, Fareed was with Flipkart as director for Product Management and was part of the core team that launched PayZippy.
“Fareed’s appointment reaffirms Freecharge’s commitment to hiring the industry’s best talent. We are on a cusp of a revolution to accelerate the FinTech capabilities in India. We look forward to Fareed’s contribution in strengthening our technical expertise and payments capabilities with his in-depth understanding of payments sector. Fareed will be responsible for developing products for customers and merchants both online and offline, in line with our vision to be the digital OS for the payments business in India.” said Freecharge COO Govind Rajan.
Fareed has been in the payments industry right from the earliest payment gateways with VeriFone in the US. He has also been part of large payment processors like Moneris Solutions in Canada and eFunds/FIS where he helped enhance the acceptance and issuance platforms for Chip Card processing.
Jawad said “Freecharge is one of the most exciting brands in the digital payments sector today and I am happy to be part of this growth journey. I look forward to creating core payment assets that will help our customers experience a frictionless payments ecosystem in the country and establish FreeCharge as the leader in the Payments space.”
Fareed has a bachelors degree in Computer Science Engineering from Dayananda Sagar College of Engineering, Bengaluru.
Brands
YES Bank hands the keys to SBI veteran Vinay Tonse as it bets on a new era
Former SBI managing director appointed as YES Bank’s new MD and CEO
MUMBAI: YES Bank is done rebuilding. Now it wants to grow. The private sector lender has appointed Vinay Muralidhar Tonse as managing director and chief executive officer-designate, with RBI approval secured and a start date of April 6, 2026 confirmed. The three-year term signals the bank’s intent to shift gears from crisis recovery to full-throttle expansion.
Tonse, 60, is no stranger to scale. Most recently managing director at State Bank of India, he oversaw a retail book of roughly $800bn in deposits and advances, one of the largest in the country. Before that, he ran SBI Mutual Fund from August 2020 to December 2022, a stint that saw assets under management surge from Rs 4.32 lakh crore to Rs 7.32 lakh crore across market cycles. Add stints in Singapore and four years leading SBI’s overseas operations in Osaka, and the incoming chief arrives with a genuinely global CV.
His academic grounding is equally solid: a commerce degree from St Joseph’s College of Commerce, Bengaluru, and a master’s in commerce from Bangalore University.
The appointment follows an extensive search and evaluation process by the bank’s Nomination and Remuneration Committee. NRC chairperson Nandita Gurjar said the committee unanimously backed Tonse, citing his leadership track record, governance credentials and ability to drive the bank’s next phase of transformation.
Non-executive chairman Rama Subramaniam Gandhi was unequivocal. “I am certain that Vinay Tonse, with his vast experience as a senior banker, will propel YES Bank to its next phase of growth,” Gandhi said, adding that the bank remains focused on strengthening its retail and corporate banking franchises and expanding its branch network.
Rajeev Kannan, non-executive director and senior executive at Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, the bank’s largest shareholder, said Tonse’s experience across retail, corporate banking, global markets and asset management positioned him well to lead the lender. SMBC said it looks forward to working with Tonse and the board as YES Bank pursues its ambition of becoming a top-tier private sector lender anchored in strong governance and sustainable growth.
Tonse succeeds Prashant Kumar, who took the helm in March 2020 when YES Bank was in freefall following a severe financial crisis, and spent six years painstakingly stabilising the institution, rebuilding governance and restoring operational scale. Gandhi was generous: “The bank remains indebted to Prashant Kumar, who is responsible for much of what a strong financial powerhouse YES Bank is today.”
Tonse, for his part, struck a purposeful note. “Together with the board and my colleagues, I remain deeply committed to creating long-term value for all our stakeholders,” he said, pledging to build on Kumar’s foundation guided by his personal motto: Make A Difference.
Beyond the balance sheet, Tonse played cricket at college and club level and represented Karnataka in archery at the national championships — sports he credits with teaching him teamwork, situational leadership, discipline and focus. In quieter moments, he reaches for retro Kannada music, classic Hindi songs, and the crooning of Engelbert Humperdinck, Mukesh and Kishore Kumar.
YES Bank has its steady-handed rebuilder in Kumar to thank for survival. Now it has a scale-obsessed growth banker at the wheel. The next chapter starts April 6.
