CIS Team

praskrishna — 2025-02-17T13:15:42Z

CIS undertakes policy-focused, applied, and academic research on topics at the intersection of internet and society, driven by concerns of human rights and public interest. CIS is based in Bengaluru and New Delhi.

Senior Staff

Tanveer Hasan A K
Amrita Sengupta

Anubha Sinha

Puthiya Purayil Sneha
Pranav M. B
Isha Suri
Pallavi Bedi
Pavan Santhosh Surampudi

Programme and Policy Officers

Shweta Mohandas
Yesha Tshering Paul
Yatharth
Nishkala
Chetna
Chiara
Garima Agrawal
Abhineet Nayyar
Nishant Shankar

A2K Team Members

Subodh Kulkarni
Nivas
Chris
Nitesh Gill
K.N. Medini

Administration and Finance

Ajoy Kumar
Nagaraj MP
Nima Lama
Velankanni Royson
Chandra Bhushan

Non-Resident Fellow

Ambika Tandon
Arindrajit Basu

Senior Staff

Amrita Sengupta
Tanveer Hasan A K
	Tanveer Hasan A K is the Executive Director of the Centre for Internet and Society. Previously, Tanveer worked at the Wikimedia Foundation leading global alliances for the Free and Open knowledge movement, and resource allocation in South Asia. In the past, Tanveer was also the Program Manager for CIS's Access to Knowledge project, and an Assistant Professor at the Centre for Indian Languages in Higher Education at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences TISS.
	Amrita Sengupta is a Research and Programme Lead at CIS. Her research interests and work lie in the areas of gender and technology, digital cultures, ethics in research methods, digital access, algorithmic biases and tech design, and sustainability and tech. She holds an undergraduate degree in sociology from Miranda House, Delhi University and a post graduate degree in internet studies from the Oxford Internet Institute. In the past, Amrita has worked in managing and implementing large scale people practices, diversity and inclusion in the workplace, as well as in conducting and leading long-form research on impacts of tech on businesses and society, with both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. E-mail: amrita@cis-india.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/iamgondogol

Anubha Sinha
	Anubha Sinha is a researcher working on impact of copyright law on access to knowledge, with a focus on users’ rights. She also tracks and comments on policymaking at international fora such as WTO and WIPO. She is a lawyer by training. Email: anubha@cis-india.org Twitter: @anubhasinha_

Anubha Sinha

Anubha Sinha is a researcher working on impact of copyright law on access to knowledge, with a focus on users’ rights. She also tracks and comments on policymaking at international fora such as WTO and WIPO. She is a lawyer by training.

Email: anubha@cis-india.org
Twitter: @anubhasinha_

Puthiya Purayil Sneha
	Sneha is a Senior Researcher with the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), India. Her areas of interest and work include digital media and cultures, arts and humanities practice, scholarship and pedagogy, and access to knowledge. Email: sneha@cis-india.org


Pranav M B
	Pranav is the Communications Lead at CIS. He has studied humanities and law at National Law School of India University, Bangalore. His previous work at CIS has primarily centred on Artificial Intelligence research, and research on issues surrounding Privacy, Cyber-security, and the Future of Work. E-mail: pranav@cis-india.org Twitter: @pranavbarkwhip

Isha Suri
	Isha Suri is a Research Lead at the Centre for Internet and Society. Her areas of interest include Telecom Policy, Competition Law, Internet Governance, Intellectual Property Rights, and Privacy and Data Protection. She holds an LL.B. (Hons.) with a specialisation in Intellectual Property Law from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. She also has a degree in Electrical Engineering that often comes to her aid when grappling with complexities of the techno-legal domain. E-mail: isha@cis-india.org
Pallavi Bedi
	Pallavi is a Senior Researcher at CIS, where she works on privacy and data protection. She is a lawyer by training, and holds a BA, LLB (Hons) degree from the National Law Institute University, Bhopal and an LLM from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. E-mail: pallavi@cis-india.org

Pavan Santhosh Surampudi
	Pavan currently spearheads the Access to Knowledge programme at the Centre for Internet and Society, focusing on catalysing the growth of the open knowledge movement across South Asia and in Indic languages. With a background of nearly a decade in the internet industry, he brings expertise in community building, content strategy, trust and safety operations, and forging partnerships. Pavan earlier worked with Quora as a community manager. His background includes launching and nurturing communities, fostering collaboration, auditing content, enforcing policies, and providing policy-level recommendations for Wikimedia projects. Pavan has been a dedicated contributor to Wikimedia Projects for many years and serves as one of the administrators for Telugu Wikipedia. His areas of interest and expertise lie in film studies, as well as the Telugu language and culture.
Researchers

Shweta Mohandas
	Shweta is a Policy Officer at the Centre for Internet and Society, India. Her areas of work and interest include Artificial Intelligence, Privacy, and Intellectual Property Rights and India’s policies surrounding them. She is currently researching on the development and use of voice based technologies in India, with a focus on languages, accessibility and privacy. E-mail: shweta@cis-india.org Twitter: @says_shweta

Yesha Tshering Paul
	Yesha Tshering Paul is a Programme Officer at the Centre for Internet and Society and works on the Digital Identities project. She studied Law at ILS Law College, Pune, and has a Masters in Regulatory Governance from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. E-mail: yesha@cis-india.org Twitter: @oldpinkdog

Yatharth
	Yatharth is a Design Researcher with CIS. His interest areas include New Media Arts, Creative Technology and Design Edcation with Anti Caste and Critical perspectives. He is a Designer and Media Artist by training from National Institute of Design Ahmedabad.
Nishkala	Nishkala is a researcher at CIS. Her research interests include urban inequality and the particular ways in which it is manifesting via platform labor, and in the digital world. She has a degree in development studies and mechanical engineering.
Chetna	Chetna is a social science researcher with a background in economics. She is interested in interdisciplinary research and seeks to understand the world in a more wholesome manner. After graduating with a master's from the University of Hyderabad in 2021, she has contributed to many research projects specifically pertaining to labour. At CIS, she researches the nature of work and challenges faced by workers in the platform economy.
Chiara	Chiara is a researcher at CIS, working on digital labour and the platformisation of work in the global south. Her areas of interest involve the politics of labour and technology, and differential experiences with digitalisation in contexts of structural inequalities. She has studied development and economics. Email: chiara@cis-india.org Twitter: @chiara_furtado

Garima Agrawal

Garima is a researcher currently working on digital safety, data security and governance at the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore, India. She also works on understanding digitalisation's impact on access to information and services, and the shape of our working lives.

Email: garima@cis-india.org

Abhineet Nayyar

Abhineet is an IIC Fellow at CIS, working primarily on AI data supply chains in India's healthcare sector. His areas of interest also include data and privacy, digital competition, and the impact of technologies on workers. Abhineet is an engineer by training, with a minor in Philosophy, Economics, and Political Science, and a recipient of the YLAC Policy in Action and the UChicago Anubhav programmes.

Email: abhineet@cis-india.org

Nishant Shankar

Nishant is a Technology Researcher at CIS. His areas of work are primarily privacy and security, which he aims to situate within the political economy of computing. Trained in computer engineering and machine learning, he worked on dataset creation and language model development during his masters. Before joining CIS, he conducted research on the political economy of software development as part of the Programmable Infrastructures project at TU Delft. His areas of interest include the business of (cloud) computing, technology policy, and alternative computing infrastructures.

Email: nishant.s@cis-india.org

A2K Team Members

Subodh Kulkarni

Subodh is Senior Program Officer in A2K team at CIS. He has been active on various development issues and has worked with several organizations across India. He is an active WIkimedian in several projects since 2015. He is working with CIS-A2K from 2017. Presently, he is building partnerships with various institutions, communities and research & social organisations to create free knowledge on Wikimedia projects. Digitisation and relicensing (releasing content in free license) are also his focus areas. He is developing 'Wiki communities with concern' for reliable, qualitative and sustainable content generation in the field of environment and gender issues.

E-mail: subodh@cis-india.org

Nivas

Nivas is a Programme Associate with the A2K team of CIS. He has been contributing to various Wikimedia projects since 2017. Before joining CIS, he was a freelancer building customised data dashboards. Currently, he is working with the technical and language communities in the Wikimedia movement to improve the basic technical understanding of language Wikimedians while understanding their technical requirements and challenges. He is also working with FOSS communities based in India to enhance the technical community of Wikimedia. He is an engineer by training, currently pursuing his Masters and loves reading concepts and facts related to Classical Physics.

E-mail: nivas@cis-india.org

Chris

Chris is a Communications Associate for the Access to Knowledge team at the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS). Fluent in six languages, they are deeply committed to social justice advocacy, especially disability rights. As an advocate for abolitionist feminist praxis and transformative justice, Chris dedicates time to nurturing ecosystems of care and envisioning collective futures. Their research interests include media archeology, archival anxiety and gender justice. Chris believes in community collaboration and strives to restructure the existing knowledge production apparatus to hold space for the fullness of our humanities.

E-mail: chris@cis-india.org


Nitesh Gill
	Nitesh is a Program Officer in A2K team at CIS. She is an active Wikimedian since 2015. She joined the A2K team in 2019. Currently, she is coordinating content creation programs in collaboration with communities. She is supporting the communities and individuals through the A2K request page. She is handling social media channels and overall communications. Email: nitesh@cis-india.org
K N Medini
	Medini is a Program Officer in A2K team at CIS. Prior to joining CIS, she worked in NGO sector. Medini has been working closely with the CIS-A2K team since 2019 handling finance and administration works besides providing logistics support towards organising events. E-mail: medini@cis-india.org

Administration and Finance

Ajoy Kumar
	Ajoy is an Administrator at the CIS. He manages all the events organised by CIS including hotel and travel bookings, does the liasoning with government offices and Members of Parliament, etc. Ajoy also works as a part-time lawyer doing property documentation. Email: ajoy@cis-india.org Resume: Download (PDF)

Ajoy Kumar

Ajoy is an Administrator at the CIS. He manages all the events organised by CIS including hotel and travel bookings, does the liasoning with government offices and Members of Parliament, etc. Ajoy also works as a part-time lawyer doing property documentation.

Email: ajoy@cis-india.org
Resume: Download (PDF)

Nagaraj MP
	Nagaraj has a background in Advanced Accountancy with a specialisation in NGO Accounting and Practices. As Manager - Finance and Operations, he handles the preparation of accounts statements, statuary compliance, budget and monitoring, and accounts for all research projects at CIS. He has previously worked at Centre for the Study of Culture and Society (CSCS), ‘Kalike’ associate organisation of TATA Trusts, India Foundation for the Arts (IFA), Ramaiah Public Policy Centre, and CIS in its early days. Email: nagaraj@cis-india.org

Nagaraj MP

Nagaraj has a background in Advanced Accountancy with a specialisation in NGO Accounting and Practices. As Manager - Finance and Operations, he handles the preparation of accounts statements, statuary compliance, budget and monitoring, and accounts for all research projects at CIS. He has previously worked at Centre for the Study of Culture and Society (CSCS), ‘Kalike’ associate organisation of TATA Trusts, India Foundation for the Arts (IFA), Ramaiah Public Policy Centre, and CIS in its early days.

Email: nagaraj@cis-india.org

Nima Lama
Nima has been in charge of security at CIS since 2015. He maintains the daily staff register and provides assistance to the administration team. Prior to CIS, Nima worked as a security person at a car parking solution.

Velankanni Royson

Royson is the Office Assistant in the Bangalore office. He assists the administration department in organising events, takes videos of the events, uploads them to the CIS website, Blip TV, YouTube, etc.

Email: royson@cis-india.org

Chandra Bhushan

Chandra has been working as an Accounts Officer with CIS since 2018 with specialties in Accounts and Banking, managing accounting software like Tally, bank accounts, bookkeeping, different types of financials for projects, utilisation certificates, etc. Earlier, he was an Officer at a nationalised bank, and thereafter was associated with a Chartered Accountant.

Email: chandraa@cis-india.org

Non-Resident Fellow

Ambika Tandon

Ambika Tandon studies the intersections of gender and technology. She focuses on women’s work in the digital economy, and the impact of emerging technologies on social inequality. She is also interested in developing feminist methods for technology research.

E-mail: ambika[at]cis-india.org
Twitter: @AmbikaTandon

Arindrajit Basu

Arindrajit Basu is a Non-resident Fellow at the Centre for Internet & Society, India, where he focuses on the geopolitics and constitutionality of emerging technologies. He is a lawyer by training and holds a BA, LLB (Hons) degree from the National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata, and an LLM in public international law from the University of Cambridge, U.K.