Supervisor: Vinay Sankar

Meera is an early career researcher studying how environmental commons and related biophysical indicators mediate the impact of development policies on the wellbeing of frontline communities for her doctoral research. She hopes to employ a political ecology perspective for this study which focuses on the people involved in clam fisheries in the Vembanad waterscape in Kerala.

Meera graduated with an Integrated Masters in Development Studies, writing her dissertation on the gendered nature of conservation practices in the Kadar Tribe in the Anamalai Hills. After seeing how both human and nature were negatively impacted by short sighted development policies, she felt a need to understand how people can influence policy. She joined the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan, a leading organisation of the movement for the Right to Information, as a Research Assistant to sociopolitical activist Aruna Roy. Interested in understanding how the private sector influences development policies, she moved to a social enterprise engaged in preventing ocean plastic pollution as a policy researcher, working on case studies on successful waste management models. With a firm belief that human wellbeing cannot be separated from environmental conservation, Meera joined ATREE to pursue an interdisciplinary PhD to understand the intricacies of the relationship between the human and the more-than-human to imagine a world where all beings have the right to a life of equality and dignity.

Publications

D, Abhijith, K.P. A. Basith, K, Nithin, & Panicker, M. M. (2024). Unwasting a Crisis Away: A Case Study of Anakkayam, a Village in Kerala. In I. Haq, A. S. Kalamdhad, & M. Khwairakpam (Eds.), Advancement in Solid Waste Management and Treatment (pp. 103–112). Springer Cham.

Roy, A., Dave, S.K, & Panicker, M. M. (2022). The Pedagogy of Equality: Empowering Participatory Democracy. In The Pedagogy of Liberation: The Theory and Practice of Critical Pedagogy. Közélet Iskolàja.