The Responsible Jewellery Council (RJC) has announced the appointment of Purvi Shah as its next Executive Director, effective 7 February 2026. Shah joins from De Beers Group, where she held the role of Head of Ethical and Sustainable Value Chains, steering initiatives in ethics, provenance assurance, and value-chain transparency for over 15 years.
Shah’s prior involvement with the RJC is significant: she has been a board member since 2023 and served as co-chair of its Standards Committee since 2018. Her contributions include helping drive the development and launch of the RJC’s Code of Practices (COP) 2024, Chain of Custody (COC) 2024 and the Laboratory-Grown Materials Standard (LGMS) 2025.
In welcoming Shah, RJC Chairman Dave Meleski noted that her “exceptional leadership and vision” in bridging commercial realities with sustainability ambition make her well-placed to guide the organization into its next era.
From an industry perspective — particularly for India’s jewellery manufacturing and retail sectors — the appointment holds several implications. With the RJC representing more than 2,000 member companies across 74 countries, spanning mine to retail, this leadership change underscores a clearer global-level focus on ESG (environmental, social and governance), traceability, and member value creation through standards-based certification.
For Indian manufacturers and retailers who source gems and metals, service export markets or aspire to certification under RJC standards, it signals a timely opportunity to review their supply-chain transparency, audit-readiness, documentation and alignment with the latest COP 2024 and chain-of-custody expectations.
Looking ahead, Shah emphasizes that her first months in the role will involve a listening phase — engaging with RJC members to understand priorities, challenges and ideas, and calibrating how the organization can better support value creation for its membership.
As regulatory and voluntary expectations around sustainable sourcing accelerate globally (including across diamonds, coloured gemstones, precious metals and manufacturing), Shah’s appointment positions the RJC to advocate for and shape fit-for-purpose standards that respond to both emerging legislation and supply-chain realities.
