Founders:
Akanksha Arora
Akanksha, the Chief Executive Officer of LexQuest Foundation, is a Lawyer and a Public Policy Professional. She has worked extensively in the domain of law and policy wherein her dedication and work ethic brought her several leadership opportunities early in her career.
While holding Executive Positions at organizations like Alexis Group, LawLex, Legal Desire, and GoUNESCO, her work helped to expand the scope of policy research in India, while her early exposure to the realm, helped her gain insight into the complexities associated with our legal system, which led her to work for inclusive policymaking.
A graduate in Public Policy from the Centre for Civil Society, Akanksha was also associated with their Project Jeevika wherein she assisted with the research on the Urban Street Vendor Bill. At the time of her associations with NGOs like PUCL she worked on a wide range of Human Rights issues and studied discrimination and injustice related to caste, class, communal and gender oppression. She was also involved in the research and advocacy for the implementation of the Right to Food Act.
Akanksha holds advanced professional degrees in Public Policy, Cyber Laws, Intellectual Property Laws, and Competition Law. Recognizing the multi-pronged challenges associated with the policy mechanism in India, she is working on expanding the scope of research and advocacy in our systems.
You can connect with her here.
Tanya Chandra
Tanya, the Chief Operating Officer of LexQuest Foundation, is a Lawyer and a Public Policy Professional, working to make social inclusion the focal point of varied policy discourses in India.
Her work highlights gender inequality in the illegality of issues such as bride trafficking, lack of reproductive rights, and focuses on finding sustainable policy solutions to make the Right to Menstrual Health, and Sexual & Reproductive Health & Rights a constitutional reality in India. To better understand the landscape of gender discrimination and social inclusion, and to gain perspective on the same, Tanya has also pursued courses on Gender and Sexuality: Diversity and Inclusion in the Workplace from the University of Pittsburgh, Health Across the Gender Spectrum from the Stanford School of Medicine, and International Women’s Health and Human Rights from the Stanford University.
During her stint at various law firms, she worked on Research Reports on subjects such as land reforms, tenancy laws, and corporate laws in India. Her work on matters involving industrial disputes laws, insurance laws, labor laws and diverse aspects of the corporate laws, exposed her to the loopholes, disparities, and conflicts of commercial regulations vis-a-vis social inclusion legislation in India.
Working on the draft recommendations of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill, 2012, for the Justice Verma Committee, helped her gain insight into the challenges of the policy mechanism to cope with complex issues. She also worked on a case commentary on the role of legal institutions in extending legal aid to the underserved communities in India. At Teach for India, she helped with the Teacher Training Program of female teachers of under-served private schools in Delhi, and at Sulabh International, her research compared the rehabilitation and livelihood policies for manual scavengers in the various States of India.
She endeavors to make Law and Public Policy implementation work in tandem, for a just society. Focusing on research and advocacy for attaining sustainable policy solutions, she aspires to make policymaking a citizen-driven tool for achieving social and economic goals.
You can connect with her here.
Mentors:
Prof. (Dr) Sanjeevi Shanthakumar
Academic Administrator, Teacher, Author and Legal Practitioner, Prof. (Dr.) Sanjeevi Shanthakumar is currently the Vice Chancellor of Gujarat National Law University. He had earlier served as the Pro-Vice Chancellor, Dean Academics and Dean, School of Law at G.D. Goenka University, Gurgaon. He was the Founder Dean, Faculty of Law at SGT University, Founder Director of ITM Law School, ITM University, Founder Director of MATS Law School, MATS University; COE & Associate Professor of Law at Hidayatullah National Law University, Raipur; Senior Lecturer at Government Law College, Madurai and Chennai.
With a teaching experience of 27 years, he has received prestigious awards like the Environmental Law Champion Development Award from Asian Development Bank, Philippines and the Best Social Scientist Award from the Indian Society of Criminology.
He is an elected member of the Governing Board to represent South and West Asia at the International Union for Conservation of Nature. He is serving as the Country Focal Point for India and a Consultant for the Asian Development Bank’s Technical Assistance project on Environment and Climate Change Law. He is the Chair of Environmental Law Study Group of the International Association of Law Schools, and a Member of the Teaching and Capacity Building Committee of the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law.
He has authored 3 books on Environmental Law and 2 books on Human Rights Law. He has published a number of research articles on various contemporary legal issues in reputed national and international journals and edited volumes. He had the privilege of being invited to deliver lectures at various premier Universities in 23 countries including Oxford University, UK. Before joining the legal academia, he was an Attorney at the Madras High Court for seven years.
Prof. (Dr) Shobhalata V. Udapudi
Dr Shobhalata V. Udapudi is a Professor of Law at Gujarat National Law University. In her experience as an academician and researcher since 1986, she has a plethora of publications in the form of Book Chapters and Journal Articles to her credit. She has edited and reviewed several books on Environmental and Science and Technology Laws in India. She was the head of a joint Research Project of Winnipeg University, Canada and the GNLU-Centre for Environment and Sustainable Development, which examined the Green Benches and National Green Tribunals in India.
Professor Udapudi was also the initiator and played an instrumental role in the creation and establishment of KLE Society’s Law Academy. She serves on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Law & Policy Review at NUJS, Kolkata and the Intellectual Property Rights Open Access Journal. She is a member of the International Society of International Law, New Delhi and has been a Technical Committee Member for the Global Science and Technology Forum (GTSF)’s Law, Regulations and Public Policy (LRPP) Conference, Singapore.
As an authority in Environmental Law, she has collaborated with nodal United Nations’ Agencies and Government of India Ministries, to augment the legal research discourse in Sustainable Development. Her research interests include Environmental Law, Sustainable Development, Intellectual Property Law with special emphasis on Patent Law and BioTechnology.
Dr Kaushiki Sanyal
She is the co-Founder and CEO of a public policy consulting, training and research start-up, Sunay Policy Advisory Pvt. Ltd. She has authored two books — Oxford India Short Introduction to Public Policy in India and Shaping Policy in India: Advocacy, Alliances, Activism (both with Oxford University Press) — and several other articles and book chapters.
Her work experiences include stints at PRS Legislative Research, Bharti Institute of Public Policy, Indian School of Business, NDTV and Capital IQ. She has also provided her invaluable advice and has worked on projects with the World Bank, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, Kamonohashi Project (Japan), and Rajiv Gandhi Foundation. She is an alumna of the US Department of State’s prestigious International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) and holds an M.A. in Political Science and a Ph.D. in International Relations from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Research Associates:
| Elizabath Pappachan | Indian Institute of Technology, Madras |
| Parvathy Ramesh | University of Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh |
| Aanchal Goswami | Centre For International Trade And Development (CITD), Jawaharlal Nehru University(JNU) |
| Mrigakshi Tandon | TERI School of Advanced Studies, New Delhi |
| Aaditya | Sri Ramswaroop College of Engineering and Management, Lucknow |
| Mukta Amale | Department of Civics and Politics, University of Mumbai |
| Shivika Aggrawal | Indira Gandhi National Open University, New Delhi |
| Swati Bhawnani | Bhopal School of Social Sciences, Madhya Pradesh |
| Sarthak | Madras School of Economics, Tamil Nadu |
| Suthida Chang | University of Nottingham, England |
| Shubhra Parihar | Janki Devi Memorial College, Delhi University |
| Sumedha Arya | Hindu College, New Delhi |
| Rishabh Kohli | Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow |
| Shivedita Singh | Malaviya National Institute of Technology, Jaipur |
| Ananya Mondal | Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management, Kolkata |
| Debokarsho Dutta | Jadavpur University, Kolkata |
| Tanya Toshali | FLAME University, Pune |
| Madalsa Jain | Damodaram Sanjivayya National Law University, Visakhapatnam |
| Mitul Luthra | University School of Architecture and Planning, New Delhi |
| Kiran Rathi | Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology, Nagpur |
| Rasveen Kaur | Indore Institute of Law, Madhya Pradesh |
| Zaffer Ishaq War | Shiv Nadar University, Greater Noida |
| Manuela Priyadarshini | Gokhale Institute of Politics & Economics, Pune |
| Ashraya Mahesh | Ashoka University, Haryana |
| Saranya Basu | Jadavpur University, Kolkata |
| Kalpika Vale | National Law School of India University, Bengaluru |
| Debarati Choudhury | Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Hyderabad |