Fulbright-Nehru Grant Category India: Fulbright-Nehru Master’s Fellowships

Anugraha P

Ms. Anugraha P completed her bachelor’s degree in engineering from PSG College of Technology and worked as Business Analyst. She joined the Indian Administrative Service in 2011 to pursue her passion for developing an equitable and inclusive society.

Ms. Anugraha P has held various leadership positions in the state of Madhya Pradesh. Her initiatives were aimed at improving the socioeconomic parameters of weaker sections of the society and at women empowerment through education and skill development programs. As District Collector in Shivpuri and Khargone, she has improved education standards in remote rural areas by upgrading school infrastructure and manpower training, by introducing innovative pedagogy, and by addressing issues of child labor, malnutrition, and migration. She is keen on implementing STEAM based learning models and advancing digital literacy in schools.

Ms. Anugraha P has promoted financial independence in women by providing entrepreneurial opportunities through convergence of government schemes and positive engagement with NGOs. She has collaborated on various projects with international agencies like ILO and UNICEF. She is also a proud recipient of Platinum Award for Excellence in Digital Governance, conferred by the President of India for her excellent initiatives in providing digital services in rural India.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellow, Ms. Anugraha P is pursuing a master’s in public administration at Harvard Kennedy School. She aspires to use data analytics in designing effective public policy and to leverage technology to make education more accessible and equitable. Along with the enriching academic curriculum, she looks forward to being a part of the global peer network.

Avny Lavasa

Ms. Avny Lavasa is a civil servant from the Indian Administrative Service working in Jammu and Kashmir. She has ten years’ of experience serving in various roles in the Indian government across the challenging regions of Jammu, Kashmir, and Ladakh. She is known for her participative approach in public service as she successfully implemented infrastructural as well as community-led projects. She is an economics graduate from the University of Delhi and has a sports management diploma from Australia. Before joining the government, she worked as a professional in the sports industry.

As Deputy Commissioner (district head) of Leh district, Ms. Lavasa worked in the Ladakh region, where she set up a widely acclaimed solid waste management system with facilities spread across the region. Her other initiatives towards mitigating major urban problems and sustainable development of the ecologically fragile region include reviving public transport system, promoting eco-friendly modes of mobility, and enforcing waste management regulations at tourism destinations.

In her role as Municipal Commissioner, Jammu city, and CEO of the Smart City Mission, Ms. Lavasa led major urban infrastructure projects, like the iconic Riverfront project and Asian Development Bank funded urban water supply and urban mobility projects, among others. She played an instrumental role in procuring, designing, and managing several urban projects in Jammu.

Ms. Lavasa is a sports enthusiast and regularly participates in half marathons. She pioneered the organization of school games in Leh. She is a keen traveler and believes that both sports and travelling have enriched her life. Sports taught her the values of team spirit, discipline, and fair play.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellow, Ms. Lavasa is pursuing urban planning to learn new aspects of urban policy, regulation, and environmental sustainability that will add to her administrative experience. She hopes to gain academic and practical insights into the area of urban reforms that will enable her to understand present and future challenges of urbanization in the world and to contribute towards better governance in her country.

Pallavi Khare

Ms. Pallavi Khare works in the field of strategic communications with a focus on community empowerment from 2019. Ms. Khare started her career as an arts and culture curator at Godrej India Culture Lab. The Godrej India Culture Lab is a cultural space and a multimedia online network that sought to amplify marginal voices across the intersections of gender, class, and region through innovative public programing. Here, Ms. Khare curated cultural events around globally pertinent issues of gender and sexuality rights, environmental conservation and community rights, and cultural place making in contemporary India. She then went on to lead community impact and public scholarship initiatives at the Indian Institute of Management, Indore such that the valuable research produced at IIMI could positively enable the local and national community, businesses, academia, and entrepreneurial endeavors.

Ms. Khare has master’s degree in media and cultural studies from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Delhi. While at TISS, she produced two documentary films: Ghutan, which documented the plight of communities displaced because of developmental projects in Mumbai as well as Aamchi BEST, which showed the impact of privatization of public transport and its repercussions on public accessibility and mobility.

Through her Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship, Ms. Khare aims to learn to leverage the potential of the multi-dimensional, dynamic, and evolving global media scape to drive social and cultural transformations.

Aman Gupta

Dr. Aman Gupta obtained a bachelor’s in engineering from the University of Delhi in 2005. Thereafter, he went to business school at the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, completing his MBA in 2007. He spent a term at the University of Lyon, France, as part of this course. Dr. Gupta worked as a credit rating analyst, from 2008 to 2010, with CRISIL Limited (a Standard and Poor’s Enterprise) and spent a few years as a co-founder of a start-up until late 2011. In December 2011, he joined the Indian Corporate Law Service of the Government of India, which regulates the functioning of companies in India.

Dr. Gupta joined the premier Indian Administrative Service in 2013 and has undertaken several assignments in the Government of NCT of Delhi and the Municipal Corporation of Delhi. Along with his work in the civil service, he has also completed a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of Delhi and a Ph.D. in management from the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow.

Dr. Gupta is a visually impaired person and is legally blind. He has a keen interest in reading, writing, and travelling.

As part of the Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship, Dr. Gupta is pursuing an LLM at Harvard University. He is studying areas of constitutional and administrative law relating to the balance of powers, balance between regulation and freedom, and trust-based governance. He hopes to be able to apply this knowledge while formulating law and policy in India and to better appreciate the nuances during their implementation. He believes this would enable him to do justice to his profession as an IAS officer in improving the lives of his fellow citizens.

Prince Dhawan

Mr. Prince Dhawan, an IAS officer by profession and a development practitioner at heart, is committed to improving the living conditions of people in his country and to nation-building. Hailing from Chandigarh, he completed his dual degree (B.Tech. and M.Tech.) from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi in electrical engineering and ICT. He was the topper and the best all round-student of his class of 2011 and was awarded the Director’s Gold Medal as well as the Director’s Silver Medal. In 2012, he secured the third rank in the all-India civil services exam and is currently placed as the topper of his batch.

Over the last decade, Mr. Dhawan has served in three state and union territory governments, including the tribal areas of Arunachal Pradesh, where he was awarded the National e-governance Award, 2017-18, and the state gold medal for outstanding contribution to public service and use of technology. Under his leadership, the state IT Department was recognized as the best performing department in the state in 2018. Currently stationed in Delhi, Mr. Dhawan is using emerging technologies for proactive governance. As District Magistrate, West Delhi, he is also actively involved in rehabilitation of street children and in upskilling of youth. To be able to better discharge his responsibilities as a public servant in the years ahead, Mr. Dhawan would like to study the key ingredients of an effective policy for different problems and environments.

During his Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship, Mr. Dhawan is studying public administration and international development at Harvard university, which helps him gain a deeper understanding of complex developmental problems and acquire the right analytical tools to design and implement solutions for them. After completing his fellowship, he aims to contribute more meaningfully to his life’s mission: empowerment of underprivileged communities and transformation of public service institutions.

Radhakrishnan Balasubramanian

Mr. Radhakrishnan Balasubramanian is a postgraduate in microbiology from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. Driven by his passion towards public service, he joined the Indian Administrative Service in the year 2008. He has served in various capacities in Maharashtra for the past 14 years and is currently the Municipal Commissioner of Nagpur Municipal Corporation.

Mr. Balasubramanian made many interventions to improve learning outcomes in government schools. His quality education initiatives served as a model for the rest of the state. As District Collector, he helped solve many complex land acquisition issues, implement land record digitization, and re-engineered the archaic fruit valuation policy of the state. He was awarded the Best District Collector Award by the Government of Maharashtra for his innovative practices in public service.

As a civic chief of Nagpur, Mr. Balasubramanian successfully implemented GIS mapping of land parcels and properties, which resulted in a substantial increase in the municipal corporation’s revenue. He planned and executed many Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects in the urban sector, such as managing the city’s drinking water supply, public transport, and streetlights.

During his Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship, Mr. Balasubramanian is pursuing a graduate degree in public administration from Harvard University. He believes this would equip him with analytical skills and approaches to public policy making. On returning to India, Mr. Balasubramanian intends to work on various issues concerning the urban sector at the state and central levels.

Naveen Anaswara

Dr. Naveen Anaswara is a service-oriented health professional and has served as the District Program Manager, National Health Mission, Kozhikode, Kerala for over half a decade. He completed his MBBS and his diploma in child health from the Government Medical College, Kozhikode, and he holds a PG diploma in health care management from Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.

Dr. Anaswara has led many innovations in the government health sector. He played a key role in the development of the COVID-19 Jagratha portal—a comprehensive IT platform to help citizens gain access to information on the covid-19 health services and support available in Kerala. This initiative earned his team two state e-governance awards. Dr. Anaswara has pioneered several other projects during COVID, such as the first-of-its-kind Tele ICU and Mobile Unit Networks across the district. He also introduced Neo Cradle: A Comprehensive Newborn Care Management System in Kerala. Under his leadership, the Kozhikode district established the state’s first breast milk bank in the government sector. In recognition of his professional excellence, the district administration presented him with a good service entry award.

During his Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship, Dr. Anaswara is studying global health at Johns Hopkins University, Maryland. Through this fellowship, he aims to bolster his knowledge and analytical skills in the public health field to work more effectively at the national and international levels.

Nikita Agarwal

Ms. Nikita Agarwal is a lawyer, policy practitioner, and community educator. She started out as a policy practitioner in 2013, focusing on addressing the food security crisis and gender-based violence in India, and built her legal practice to bridge the gap between the theoretical and practical applications of law. She has primarily represented indigenous communities in the conflict zone of South Chhattisgarh, and women, children, and religious minorities in Delhi.

Ms. Agarwal was appointed member of the Committee Against Sexual Harassment of the Chhattisgarh Bar Council. She regularly drafts workplace sexual harassment policies and is a gender and sexuality trainer. Through her research and documentation work, she has engaged with issues around labor, conflict, gender and sexuality, forest rights, and the criminalization of the lives of indigenous people and de-notified tribes, among others.

Ms. Agarwal is a graduate of National Law University, Delhi. As a student, she founded the student volunteer group Aaghaaz to provide need-based education to women and children on campus and outside. She simultaneously became involved with the Narmada Bachao Andolan, a people’s anti-displacement resistance movement in Madhya Pradesh, which helped her understand the need to work with law in a holistic manner—synergizing reform processes, litigation, and community mobilizing.

During her Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship, Ms. Agarwal aims to study the U.S. criminal justice and legal aid systems. After completing her fellowship, Ms. Agarwal intends to build a practice with community lawyers and paralegals, to addresses the crisis of legal aid in India.

Tanita Abraham

Ms. Tanita Abraham is an independent consultant who has been working in the higher education space for around a decade. She works with universities and graduate programs to help shape them, lay a strong foundation for governance, and build them sustainably for the future. She helped set up the office of faculty and research at Ashoka University, among other projects in its first five years of inception.

Ms. Abraham completed the Young India Fellowship in 2014, a program that inspired her to work in higher education and to help other learners get the best out of their classroom experience. She also worked as a journalist with The Hindu at the Hyderabad desk and graduated from the Asian College of Journalism in Chennai. She completed her bachelor’s degree from Christ College, Bengaluru in English, psychology, and journalism.

Through her Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellowship at Harvard University, Ms. Abraham hopes to understand the foundations of higher education better and further the work around access and inclusion in India.

Devanshu Sajlan

Devanshu Sajlan, a judge by profession, is passionate about analyzing the interplay between law and the rights of marginalized groups in India. Officiating as a judge at Tis Hazari Courts since 2019, he has passed more than 200 judgments pertaining to diverse areas of law. His judgments dealing with contract law (non-compete clauses), defamation law, sexual crimes, and crimes against society have been reported by SCC Online, a leading law journal of India. He was also one of the first judges in New Delhi to record evidence through videoconferencing mode during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hailing from New Delhi, Devanshu studied law at National Law University, Delhi. He was awarded the Pandit Shri Girdhari Lal Salwan gold medal in 2014. After graduating, he started working at one of India’s leading corporate law firms, AZB & Partners, where he worked on multiple transactions with international institutions like the International Finance Corporation, American Tower Corporation, and Asian Development Bank. Thereafter, to pursue his passion for criminal litigation and human rights, he joined the chamber of Neeraj Kishan Kaul, Senior Advocate, and former Additional Solicitor General of India. Devanshu also joined the panel of Delhi Legal Services Authority in 2018 as an independent practitioner to help indigent litigants and undertrial prisoners.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Master’s fellow, Devanshu is studying the criminal justice courses dealing with issues of bail jurisprudence specifically faced by indigent prisoners. He feels this will enable him to find improved solutions to the plight of thousands of disenfranchised under-trial prisoners in India.