Vivek's Info

Hi.  My name is Vivek and I am a doctoral student at Syracuse University, New York.  I’m doing my Ph.D. in social sciences at Maxwell School of Syracuse University.  Prior to this, I studied at the Delhi School of economics (1997-2000), at St. Josephs College, Trichy (1994-97) and at St.  John’s Vestry school at Trichy.  Between these, I was engaged in development issues in India through the Right to Food Campaign, National Alliance for the Fundamental Right to Education (NAFRE) and a brief stint at the International Crop Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Topics (ICRISAT).

These campaigns gave me the opportunity to travel to many parts of India and to learn about development issues first-hand.  In the process, I also worked on a number of programs including the Mid-day Meal Scheme, NREGA, ICDS, old-age pensions, public distribution system and related issues like the use of right information in combating corruption.  This website will reflect my interests, and the content here owes a lot to these experiences.

My journeys to different parts of India made me realise the stark differences in how governments function in different parts of the country, which subsequently became my research question for the Ph.D. I spent 13 months in Tamil Nadu trying to understand why the performance of the state in providing public services is remarkably better than most other states in India.  As a part of this, I spent a considerable amount of time inside block offices, with Panchayat presidents as well as the civil society.

I’m currently in the process of writing my dissertation, and I hope to start my next episode by May 2010.