First Steps

Pankaj Sekhsaria

Pankaj Sekhsaria is a member of the environmental action group, Kalpavriksh where he works on issues of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and also edits the bi-monthly newsletter, the Protected Area Update. He is a freelance journalist, photographer and author, most recently, of 'Islands in flux - the Andaman and Nicobar Story' (HarperCollins India 2017) and 'The Last Wave – an island novel' (HarperCollins India 2014). He has authored/edited three other, non-fiction books, two of which are based in the A&N Islands He graduated as a mechanical engineer from the Pune University in 1993 and followed this with a Master’s Degree in Mass Communication from the Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Milia Islamia, New Delhi, in 1998. He was awarded a doctorate in 2016 in Science and Technology Studies (STS) from Maastricht University, Netherlands, for his thesis ‘Enculturing Innovation – Indian engagements with nanotechnology’. The thesis investigates scientific research and innovation practices in five nanotechnology laboratories in India and explores the societal and cultural influences on research and on innovation inside the laboratory. He is currently Senior Project Scientist, DST-Centre for Policy Research, Dept. of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT-Delhi