Dr. Vivek Bhandari is the Director and Professor of Social Science at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA) in India, is an alumnus of St. Stephen’s College, Delhi, and the University of Pennsylvania. After earning his doctorate from Penn in 1998, he became a faculty member in the School of Social Sciences at Hampshire College in Amherst, MA. In this capacity, Dr.
Sanjoy Chakravorty is Professor of Geography and Urban Studies and Director of Global Studies at Temple University and a CASI Non-Resident Scholar. He chaired his department from 2005-10 and during that time was instrumental in creating its doctoral program and undergraduate major in Environmental Studies.
Jawed Usmani is an officer of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS). He joined the IAS in 1978 and was allotted to the UP cadre. He has more than three decades of experience of working in administration in India at various levels; in the districts, the state government, and at the centre.
P. S. Vijay Shankar is the Director of Research and afounding member of Samaj Pragati Sahayog (SPS), an NGO based in Dewas district of Madhya Pradesh. He earned his M.Phil. from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. As part of SPS, Mr. Shankar has lived and worked among the tribal communities of the Narmada valley for the last twenty years. His areas of interest are water resource management, sustainable agriculture, and strengthening of community-based, equitable and self-reliant peoples’ institutions.
CASI-New India Foundation Spring Visiting Scholar
Binod Khadria is professor of economics and education, and Chairperson of the Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies within the School of Social Sciences at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He is also Director of the International Migration and Diaspora Studies (IMDS) Project, co-sponsored by the Government of India.
Dr. Sanal Mohan is currently an Associate Professor in the School of Social Sciences of Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam, India. In 2008, he was a Graduate School Postdoctoral Fellow in Colonial and Postcolonial Studies at the Department of History and ICIS/RDI Research Fellow, Emory University, Atlanta. He was formerly a Fellow in History at CSSS Calcutta, Charles Wallace India Fellow in History, SOAS, University of London.
Chinki Sinha is a journalist based in New Delhi. She worked for The Indian Express and covered a range of issues including primary education and the Right of All Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009. She finished her Master’s in journalism from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University, and worked at the Utica Observer-Dispatch, a mid-size newspaper in New York state. There, she covered education and minority communities, including refugees and issues of integration in schools for people in exile.
T. Sundararaman is the Global Coordinator of People's Health Movement and former Executive Director of National Health Systems Resource Centre in New Delhi, a position he began in May 2007. He is also a Member Secretary of the Sector Innovation Council for the Health Sector. From 2002-07, he was Director of State Health Resource Center in Chhattisgarh where he provided technical guidance to launch a major community health worker program and strengthened its public health system.
Srinath Raghavan is a Senior Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi. Previously, he was Lecturer in Defence Studies at King’s College London. He has been associated with King’s College’s e-learning program, “War in the Modern World,” and was a Visiting Lecturer at Royal Air Force College, Cranwell. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in War Studies from King’s College London. Prior to joining academia, he spent six years as an infantry officer in the Indian army.