Rajni Bakshi

Rajni Bakshi

former Gandhi Peace Fellow

Rajni Bakshi was the Gandhi Peace Fellow at Gateway House from 2011 till 2017. A Mumbai-based author, she published a Research paper in October 2012 titled Civilizational Gandhi. Rajni has a BA from George Washington University and an MA from the University of Rajasthan. She is the author of Bazaars, Conversations and Freedom: for a market culture beyond greed and fear (Penguin, 2009), which won two Vodafone-Crossword Awards. Her earlier book, Bapu Kuti: Journeys in Rediscovery of Gandhi (Penguin, 1998) inspired the Hindi film Swades starring Shah Rukh Khan. Her other books include: Long Haul: the Bombay Textile Workers Strike 1982-83 (1986), A Warning and an Opportunity: the Dispute over Swami Vivekananda’s Legacy (1994), Lets Make it Happen: a backgrounder on New Economics (2003) and An Economics for Well-Being (2007). Rajni serves on the Boards of Child Rights and You (CRY) and Citizens for Peace. She is also a member of the Executive Committee of the Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti, an autonomous body under the Ministry of Culture and a long term associate of Centre of Education and Documentation (Mumbai & Bangalore). Download high-res bio image
Expertise

Peace, Economic democracy, electoral politics, social protests, climate change and sustainable development

Last modified: June 29, 2017

Recent projects

rediff Courtesy:
28 August 2014 rediff news

B K S Iyengar, U R Ananthamurthy: India’s beacons

Rajni Bakshi, Senior Gandhi Peace Fellow, Gateway House speaks about how Iyengar and U.R. Ananthamurthy embodied cultural self-confidence, and how celebrating and nurturing this legacy would be the best tribute to them

RichardAttenborough Courtesy: wikimedia\commons
26 August 2014 Gateway House

A tribute to Attenborough

British actor and film maker Richard Attenborough, director of the film 'Gandhi’, passed away on August 24th. A tribute by Rajni Bakshi, Senior Gandhi Peace Fellow at Gateway House
wto2 Courtesy: Food Corporation of India
1 August 2014 Gateway House

WTO, sovereignty and trade

India's refusal to budge on food security has resulted in the World Trade Organization’s failure to reach the first multilateral trade agreement in the last two decades. Having taken a tough stand can India take the lead, among developing countries, in reframing the power equations of globalisation?
food-sedurity Courtesy: Rigues/Flickr
25 July 2014 Gateway House

Food security, WTO and India

Recent developments at the WTO's two-day General Council Meeting that started on July 24 suggest that India will agree to sign the trade facilitation agreement only if the deal comes bundled with a permanent solution that will allow unhindered roll-out of welfare schemes such as the food security programme.
bhutan1 Courtesy: MEA
18 June 2014 Gateway House

Gross regional happiness

Economic security needs to be defined holistically through an open and democratic discourse. A plurality of perspectives on what constitutes development is essential to democracy across the world. Grass roots protests are driven by a longing for a truly inclusive and fair model of growth.
Kudankulam-protest-pti2 Courtesy: Wikimedia\Commons
17 June 2014 Gateway House

Economic security and globalised protest

The allegations that certain foreign-funded NGOs are hurting national economic security are not new. However, the Intelligence Bureau’s claim that they have held back India’s GNP growth has been challenged. There is now a need for economic security to be defined holistically through open and democratic discourse
ED Courtesy:
13 June 2014 Gateway House

Marketplace sarvodayanomics

Sarvodaya is market economics, with a soul. There are different means towards achieving this end, but the evangelists need to come up common mantra and thwart vested interests from benefiting a few
waste Courtesy: commons.wikimedia.org
6 June 2014 Gateway House

Development and extinction

A recent report highlights the drastic damage being caused to the environment by human activity and underlines the need to address this. A warning that environmental groups advising the new government in India must pay heed to.