Advocacy Fellows 2011 1.

Jaypal Rana A village pradhan in Tehri district, Uttarakhand, Jaypal has been associated with Society for Integrated Development of Himalayas (SIDH) for almost two decades. He has been actively involved in various youth camps, teacher training programs, research projects and other educational initiatives at the community level. He sees the fellowship experience as a valuable tool in deepening his understanding of grassroots work which could be applied to his own community and his role in local governance. 2. Siman Hansdak A post graduate in Rural Development from Xavier Institute of Social Service, Siman has over 4 years of experience in the development sector with a focus on sustainable and inclusive economic development through community-based livelihood initiatives. He has been professionally associated with organisations like Jharkhand Adivasi Health Education and Rural Development Society, Mines Monitoring Centre and Bindrai Institute for Research Study and Action. His personal history includes the experience of a dam displaced family. 3. Tarini Manchanda Tarini is the co-founder of Get on the Bus Productions, a film production collective that focuses on issues of international justice using film and media to share stories in an engaging way. She has directed several short films based on peoples struggles such as Narmada Rising and A Dam Old Story on the Renuka dam. 4. Valay Singh Valay has been with the NDTV News Network in New Delhi, as an Output Editor for over 3 years. A post graduate in journalism and a documentary photographer, he is interested in documenting the rapid changes taking place in the country, their impact on the marginalized and how better models of development could be evolved. He is now Media Officer, Save the Children. 5. Shraddha Pandey Shraddha is a final year law student at Lucknow University. At the young age of 21, Shraddha and her sister setup Aksharangna, an organization that works towards educational and livelihood opportunities for children and women living in slums in Lucknow. This social venture received recognition from institutes like Benaras Hindu University and TISS Social Entrepreneurs Forum. 6. Selva Ganapathy Selva is a Technical Superintendent at IIT, Chennai. He has an educational background in chemistry with teaching experience at ISRO and IIT, Delhi. Selva has volunteered with Association for Indias Development (AID) for over 7 years alongside his career in science. He has been keenly studying organic farming and is working on various initiatives towards its wider adoption by the farmer and society. 7. Samantha Agarwal A student of Political Science and Environmental Policy from Ohio State University, Samantha has been closely studying indigenous peoples movements in India. Inspired by a field trip to Andhra Pradesh for her honors thesis on Special Economic Zones and farmer resistance, Samantha is currently studying the mass movements of the mining affected community in Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh. 8. Pallav Thudgar (has exited the Advocacy Fellowship) Pallav has been involved in the field of alternative education and slum community initiatives in Madhya Pradesh since 2001. Hailing from Hoshangabad, he has been working with NGOs like Ekalavya and Muskaan since his days in college. He is passionate about using the audio-visual medium to document the stories and histories of marginalized communities and making them accessible to a wider audience.