Prof. Sukhadeo Thorat is an economist, awarded with Padma Shri for his contributions to the field of economics, Dalit studies and Indian academics in general. He has chaired the University Grants Commission and the Indian Council of Social Science Research in the past. Currently he is a Professor Emeritus at the Center for Economic Studies and Planning at Jawaharlal Nehru University, a Distinguished Professor at the Savitribai Phule Pune University and the K. R. Narayanan Chair for Human Rights and Social Justice at the Mahatma Gandhi University, Kerala. He founded and directed the Indian Institute of Dalit Studies prior to his appointment as the chair of UGC. He is also a recipient of the Mother Teresa International Award and Babasaheb Ambedkar Ratna Award (awarded by the Delhi government
Prof. Srikrishna Deva Rao is the Vice Chancellor of the National Law University of Odisha. He has been actively involved in legal education and research in India at four National Law Schools: National Law School of India University Bangalore, National Law University Delhi, NALSAR Hyderabad and Gujarat National University Gandhi Nagar, in addition to his involvement in the Jawaharlal Nehru University and University of Delhi. He was a member of the UGC expert committee in law to transform legal education in India. He was also a visiting fellow at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), London and the University of Washington at Seattle. He has worked on projects with UKERI, UNDP, Law Commission of India and Ministry of Law and Justice.
Prof. Kalapna Kannabiran is a professor of Sociology and the director of the Council for Social Development, Hyderabad. Prof Kalpana is a recipient of the Amartya Sen Award for Distinguished Social Scientists for her work in the discipline of law and the VKRV Rao Prize for Social Science Research in the field of Social Aspects of Law by the ICSSR in 2003. She was part of the founding faculty of NALSAR University of Law and the co-founder of Asmita Resource Centre for Women. She was also a member of the Expert Group on the Equal Opportunity Commission, Government of India and the General Secretary of the Indian Association for Women’s Studies. She has also been a member of the Executive Committee of the International Sociological Association.
Prof. Virginius Xaxa is an Indian sociologist who has come to be known for his chairpersonship of a High Level Committee (HLC) constituted by the Prime Minister’s Office in 2013, mandated to examine the socio economic, educational and health status of tribal communities to recommend appropriate interventional measures to improve the same. The committee, widely known as the Xaxa Committee submitted its report in 2014. He is currently a Professor of Eminence at the Department of Sociology, Tezpur University. He held post-doctoral fellowship under Indo-French Cultural Exchange Programme at Maison des Sciences de l’homme, Paris. He was a Commonwealth Academic Staff Fellow at School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London and a Fullbright Fellow at University of California Santa Cruz, USA. He held the Rajiv Gandhi Chair in Contemporary Studies at North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong from 2006-08. He was a Professor and Deputy Director at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Guwahati Campus. He has been an Advisory Member in the Centre of Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policies in the universities in Goa, Manipur and Hyderabad. He has also been a member of academic bodies of universities at Mumbai, Hyderabad, NEHU, Gujarat and NBU as well as in ICSSR, Nehru Memorial Museum, Library Society and Giri Institute of Development Studies. He has also been a member of the National Advisory Council, Government of India.
Prof. Ritu Dewan is the Vice President of the Indian Society of Labour Economics and was the President of Indian Association for Women’s Studies. She was the Director of the Department of Economics, University of Mumbai and the founder member of the first Centre of Gender Economics. She was a member of the Feminist Economists’ Group for Engendering the 12th and 11th Five Year Plans as well as of the sub-group on ‘Gender and Macro-policies’ appointed by the Planning Commission, Government of India. She is closely associated with research; training and capacity building related to gender budgeting and has published widely on gender issues. She has also been a consultant to UNDP, UN Women, ILO, World Wildlife Fund, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, Kashmir Foundation of Peace and Development and Action Aid. Her Honorary positions include National Executive Member of the Pakistan India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy, Honorary Advisor to the Kashmir Foundation for Peace and Development Studies and Board of Trustee of the Centre for Budget Governance and Accountability.
Dr. C. T. Arvindakumar is the Pro- Vice Chancellor of the Mahatma Gandhi University of Kottayam, Kerala he is also a professor at the School of Environmental Sciences and the Director of the Inter University Instrumentation Centre, Government of Kerala. He is the Head of the Sophisticated Analytical Instrument Facility. He is the recipient of ICSC- World Laboratory (Switzerland) fellowship. He had a post-doctoral fellowship at Max-Planck-Society, Strahlenchemie. He was a Visiting Faculty at the Department of Biophysics, VRIJE Universiteit, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He established the Environmental Engineering Division of the California Institute of Technology, USA and Department of Chemistry at Pohang University of Science and Technology at South Korea, Radiation Biology Division of GSF-National Research Centre for Environment and Health, Germany etc. He was selected as the Visiting Professor at the Laboratory of Geology and Environment, University of Paris-est Marne-la-Valee, France in 2013 and 2015.
Prof. Praveen Jha is a Professor at the Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University. He is one of the editors of a tri-continental journal, Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy. Along with his teaching experience in the CESP, JNU, Prof. Jha has also taught in the LBS National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie and St. Stephan’s College. He has also taught at the University of Bremen, Germany and he has been a Visiting Fellow at Tianjin University of Finance and Economics, Tianjin, China and he was a Visiting Senior Research Economist in International Labour Organisation, Geneva. He has been associated with the Global Advisory Committee of UNDP as a member of the Governance Assessment Programmes. He has also been a member of the Committee of State Planning Board on Creation of Employment Opportunities, Government of Tripura, Committee on State Agrarian Relations and the Unfinished Task in Land Relations, Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India. He has been a part of the task force on Labour Laws, National Commission for the Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector, Government of India and an Expert for Advisory Committee of Buddhist Study Centre of UGC.
Prof. Lakshmi Lingam was the Deputy Director at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Hyderabad. An expert in Gender Studies, Prof Lingam was a scholar on the International Visitors Leadership Programme of the USIA, a Fulbright New Century Scholar during 2004-05 and a Nehru Fulbright Fellow in 2015. She was an Indo-Shastri Visiting Scholar at the University of Montreal, Montreal, Canada, Visiting Fellow, Gender, Sexuality and Law Fellowship Programme, School of Law, Keele University Keele, North Staffordshire. She was the General Secretary of the Indian Association for Women’s Studies and a member of the National Resource Group of the Government of India, Mahila Samakhya programme for women’s empowerment under MHRD, Government of India. She is on the Curriculum Advisory Boards, Executive Committees and Academic Councils of several Indian universities as well as a member of Technical and Ethical Advisory Boards, Internal Complaints Committees of academic institutions, governmental bodies and NGOs
Prof. Shruti Tambe is the Head at the Department of Sociology, Savitribai Phule Pune University. She is also the Director of the Euroculture Programme under Erasmus Mundus at Savitribai Phule Pune University. Prof. Tambe has been a Visiting Professor at OISE, University of Toronto, Canada. She is an active member of the International Sociological Association, serving as editor of the newsletter of RC 47 and a member of the Board. She has received fellowships instituted by the UGC, CODESRIA- SEPHIS, UNESCO, ISA. She is also the Coordinator for the Social Sciences of the Teaching Learning Centre, MHRD, Government of India. She is a member of the Managing Committee of the Indian Sociological Society. She has been involved with collaborative international research projects including one sponsored by SSHRC, Canada and another funded by Toyota Foundation, Japan.
