Bikash Chowdhury Barua: Chairman of BASUG did his B.A (Honours) and M.A. in English literature and language. He started his career as a Reporter with a national English daily newspaper in Bangladesh. He is also Director of the Global Academy on Migration and Development (GAMD) and a member of the International Steering Committee of the GFMD Civil Society. He is a working group member of e-MFP (European Microfinance Platform, Luxembourg) and Vice-Chairman of International Centre for Development Strategies (ICDS), a Germany-based Platform of Bangladeshi expatriates across the globe. In early nineties Mr. Chowdhury worked with the Amsterdam-based news agency, IPS (Inter Press Service) as freelance Reporter. He worked with Novib in 1991 as Consultant on Bangladesh and the Swiss development organisation, HEKS the same year. He has extensive experience in development work, especially in the field of migration and development and presented papers and took part in many international conferences and seminars as panel member which include  among others: at the UN Geneva on ‘GFMD dialogue on the GCM implementation’ on 4 Sept 2018; at UN New York at IOM’s New York Migration Series on “Bringing Migration into the Post-2015 Agenda: Bridging the Divergent Views on Migration and Development” on 28 April 2014; UN interactive hearings at UN General Assembly on migration & development in New York in 2006 and 2013; Panel member at the World Bank and IFAD ‘World Remittance Forum’ in Bangkok in 2013; all Global Forums on Migration and Development (GFMD) from 2007 to 2020; Tagaytay conference on migration, remittance & development” in the Philippines (2006), European Microfinance Platform (e-MFP) conference in Luxembourg (2006); 2^nd global conference on ‘microfinance, remittance and development’in Benin, Africa (2007). He regularly writes column for a daily newspaper in Bangladesh. He was the Joint Secretary of Chittagong Union of Journalist (CUJ), founding Secretary of Reporters Standing Committee of Chittagong Union of Journalists and member of Dhaka Union of Journalists (DUJ) until 1990 in Bangladesh. He is the author of three books, titled ‘Europe Theky’ (From Europe) published in 1993, ‘Firey Dekha’ (Looking Back) in 2011 and ‘Osongboddho Sanglap (2011). Two more books are awaiting publication in February 2021.

Dr. Runa Laila, Vice-Chairman of BASUG is an active member of BASUG since its inception joined the organization in August 2013 as Vice-Chairman. Obtained Ph D from the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS) of Erasmus University Rotterdam, the Netherlands, Runa Laila did her Masters in Development studies with specialization in Women, Gender and Development at ISS in 2003-2004. Her subject of Ph D research is: State policy, Gender Inequality and Ethnicity: Women negotiating for reproductive health and well-being in rural Bangladesh. Her teaching experience since 1996 in diverse social science subjects includes: Demography, Research Methodology, Gender & History and Women in Development while her research interest includes Safe motherhood, Family planning, Adolescent’s reproductive health, Marriage and kinship systems, Family law, Livelihood systems and Ethnicity. She has taken active part in all the program of BASUG from the very beginning and was the Joint Editor of BASUG Newsletter for some time. Runa did her Masters and Bachelor degree in Sociology from the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh in 1994. Runa has a brilliant academic career and worked as Teaching Research Assistant (TRA) at ISS (2012), Assistant Professor at the Department of Women and Gender Studies, University of Dhaka (from 2004 till date), Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Rajshahi, Bangladesh (1996-2004), Lecturer at Bangladesh Institute of Technology, Chittagong (1995-1996) and Research assistant with Save the Children, Dhaka, Bangladesh (1995). She has presented a good number of research papers in the United States, India, the Netherlands and Bangladesh.

Sudhier Nannan, Secretary of BASUG is an IT specilist and media expert. He is the founder Secretary of Stichting Triveni which aims at promoting quality in eastern art, culture, music and dance, Director of Tri Consultancy. Apart from the tasks of Secretary, Sudhier is also responsible for the maintenance of BASUG’s website. He is a member of the DFD IT Committee. Sudhier did his 4 years HBO (Beleid en Bestuur & Management) and worked with KPN Telecom, Ministry of Defence, ABN-AMRO Bank. Attended a number of international conferences, among them the 61^st annual conference of UN DGI in Paris in August 2008 where he had an informal meeting with former Prime Minister of the Netherlands Mr Ruud Lubbers. He is now the CEO of Tri Consulting, an IT company in the Netherlands. Sudhier is a popular Radio DJ at a national Radio station in the Netherlands and his Sunday evening Entertainment show at Sunrise FM is a well listened radio program.

Saleam Akleam, Joint Secretary of BASUG a young Account Manager from Amsterdam joined BASUG as Joint Secretary in 2014. Saleam studied HTS Electrical Engineering with “business Administration” as specialization at Hogeschool van Amsterdam (Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences)
He started his career in Technische Unie, member of the Sonepar Group, the world’s largest privately-held electrical distributor. And now he is working as Account Manager with Hilti Nederland. His motto: “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want”

Marie Louise van der Kruk, Treasurer of BASUG was born in s’Gravenzande in a family of 11 children. Louise is the youngest of all. Mother of a child, David, Louise lived for many years in Tanzania where she was involved in conducting workshop for the handicapped children. She also started her own centre for English-speaking Children in Das es Salaam, Tanzania. After working for certain period there, proposal came from the Tanzanian teachers if they could start with a school for the autistic children. So, a land was arranged soon and the school started functioning for the unfortunate children who had little opportunity to receive extra attention from the society. After living in Tanzania, Louise moved to India, New Delhi. Louise later moved to Suriname, where she started working with the detailed people in the jail. She met with a number of Dutch prisoners there caught with drugs. She gave them counselling to lead a good life, avoid path which might bring them to wrong destination. Now back to the Netherlands, already 10 years, Louise has now been working for the handicapped people where the inmates are guided 24 hours a day. Passion for work for the needy and the third world countries prompted Louise to join BASUG and she hopes that she would do her best for the welfare of the people.