Lavanya Suresh is an Associate Professor at BITS-Pilani, Hyderabad campus. After her PhD in Political Science (from ISEC Bangalore), she joined Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Hyderabad as an Assistant Professor. She was awarded the visiting research scholar fellowship under the Graduate Development Program of the Watson Institute of International Studies at Brown University, USA. Her work focuses on the political ecology of commons in India, with a broader interest in decentralisation and public administration. Besides publications in leading social science journals, she co- authored Decentralised Democracy: Gandhi’s Vision and Indian Reality (2017). She is PI and Co-PI in several funded projects.