upGrad Elevates Koell Hemdev to General Counsel & CHRO

By: Women Entrepreneurs Review Team | Thursday, 10 September 2026

upGrad has elevated Koell Hemdev to General Counsel and Chief Human Resources Officer, expanding her leadership mandate to cover the company’s legal and people functions. The move brings governance, talent and culture responsibilities under a unified leadership charter as the edtech company continues to expand its operations.

Koell will oversee upGrad’s legal and human resources functions in her expanded role. She will also lead an initiative focused on building a stronger and more connected community for the company’s alumni and prospective learners. The expanded mandate places her at the intersection of legal, people, culture and governance priorities.

Koell joined upGrad in 2017 and has played a key role in developing its legal function. Over the years, she has helped build the function as the company expanded across businesses and markets. Her current leadership responsibilities also include supporting major corporate and strategic transactions.

Key Highlights:

• Koell elevates to General Counsel and CHRO at upGrad
• She will oversee legal, HR, people and governance functions
• Koell has led upGrad’s legal function since joining in 2017

Her appearance was recently seen in upGrad's over $200 million acquisition of Unacademy. Along with Company Secretary and Director of Legal Khushboo Shah and Vice President of Group Finance Controller Vaibhav Bhandari, Hemdev was a member of the in-house team for the acquisition, as reported by Bar & Bench.

Koell has also made it clear that the Unacademy transaction involved a number of cross functional activities that included strategy, finance, legal, regulatory and tax, and people and operations. Her leadership is indicative of the impact that legal and governance leadership has had on the growth and expansion of upGrad.

Koell said that the new mandate has led to growth in the company and led to functions which were previously operating independently and now cooperate to a greater extent. She said her new role as the General Counsel to take on HR was logical, as it would make people's strategy and governance strategy closer.

She said that her next role will be building up the people, culture and governance aspects of upGrad, which will help it grow in a sustainable manner, and also build a stronger alumni network and prospective learner’s network.

The company's addition to the education and skills space comes as a result of the company's business growth and strategic acquisition plans. The addition is another step up in UpGrad's efforts to strengthen its presence in the education and skills segment through business growth and strategic acquisition plans. The company has kept Koell in the senior leadership group information on its corporate leadership and named Saurabh Deep Singla as the Chief Human Resource Officer, Koell as the Legal information in the same group.