Sonia Gandhi

Director, Gandhi Creations & Advisory Board Member, Multicultural NSW (NSW Government)

From international student to creative genius, Sonia Sadiq Gandhi M. Com is a serial entrepreneur and a champion of diversity and inclusion. She is an Australian Indian who arrived in Sydney, New South Wales in 1998.

Sonia has a Master of Commerce with Major in Human Resources from the Western Sydney University.

In the fearless fashion that Sonia regularly embodies, she founded a multi-award-winning marketing and events enterprise, Gandhi Creations Pty Ltd (GC). A marketing and events agency, that has for over a decade created sustainable platforms in response to business, social and cultural needs of our communities. Through a suite of annual business and community initiatives, GC actively works to service and support Australia’s creative and business sector by providing opportunities for Indigenous, migrant, refugee, and cultural and linguistically diverse groups.

With over two decades of experience, Sonia’s work directly promotes a more diverse Australia by engaging with first nations and multicultural communities. Sonia has executed over 550 events in her career and continues to economically empower Australia’s diverse diasporas. On a broader level, the work she produces has served as meeting grounds for the exchange of ideas between nations and platforms for enhanced cultural diplomacy and improved foreign investment and trade. Over the year’s she has also gained respect and trust of several high-profile Federal and State Government departments, for whom she has produced a series of multi-stakeholder projects of national significance.

Sonia was appointed to the board of the Multicultural NSW, (2017) the peak government agency whose purpose is to build and maintain a cohesive and harmonious multicultural society that enriches the lives of all the people of NSW.

Sonia has been nominated as an Australia Day Ambassador six years in a row in recognition for her work across diversity and inclusion initiatives by the Australia Day Council.

Sonia was recently appointed to the Australia India Institute Advisory board, Australia’s leading centre dedicated to promoting support for and understanding of the Australia-India relationship.

She was appointed Diversity Champion and Ambassador for the recently held global sporting event, ICC Men’s T20 2022 World Cup in Australia, actively promoting the tournament and previously was honoured to be a diversity champion for the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup.

Sonia also was recognised as a Paul Harris Fellow by Rotary International in 2014 and was recently appointed as an Ambassador for the Mental Health Foundation of Australia. She continues her ongoing charity work with organisations such as Alzheimer’s Australia, Beyond Blue and the National Breast Cancer Foundation.

In 2017, her company Gandhi Creations won the Australian Event Award for Best New Event in South Australia, ACT and Northern Territory for Confluence, A Festival of India in Australia. In 2015 her concept Cultural Diversity and Inclusion Day took the Best New Event for New South Wales as well as in 2013 she was awarded the Best Community Event Category for the Premier’s Harmony Dinner. (The Australian Event Awards is the pinnacle awards program that rewards achievements across all segments of the events industry in Australia).

Sonia invites communities to engage across innovative platforms she has founded such as Fabrics of Multicultural Australia (FOMA), a sustainable platform that stimulates economic growth for the creative sector, generates bilateral trading opportunities while fostering social cohesion.

She is also founder of the India Australia Business & Community Awards (IABCA), an international initiative that celebrates the India-Australia relationship whilst simultaneously contributing to its development, by honouring our people-to-people links. IABCA has achieved international recognition as a tool for cultural diplomacy, bilateral trade development between the two countries.

Sonia is also strategic advisor and producer of the 33rd Annual the Western Sydney Awards for Business Excellence, the premier platform for the Greater Western Sydney Region, the engine room of the NSW economy. WSABE stretches across 150 post codes and has representation from 32 business chambers, including local, state, and federal governments.

Sonia is also strategic advisor to Australia largest India think tank Australia India Institute based in VIC.

Most importantly, Sonia is a proud mother of a six-year-old with a supportive husband and is blessed with a beautiful family that continues to inspire her at every stage.

Sonia maintains meaningful relationships with family and friends by perfectly balancing her personal and professional career and believes that an all-rounded effort goes a long way in one’s overall sense of wellbeing, development & success.

Sonia is blessed to live in Australia, a land of opportunities and continues to promote intercultural connectivity and community collaborations, working towards a stronger, more unified Australia while sharing her proud Indian heritage.