14 Facts About Harsh Mander

Harsh Mander was born on 17 April 1955 and is an Indian author, columnist, researcher, teacher, and social activist who started the Karwan-e-Mohabbat campaign in solidarity with the victims of communal or religiously motivated violence.

Harsh Mander is the Director of the Center for Equity Studies, a research organisation based in New Delhi.

Harsh Mander served as Special Commissioner to the Supreme Court of India in the Right to Food Campaign and was a member of the National Advisory Council of the Government of India, set up under the UPA government.

Harsh Mander is a founding member of the National Campaign for the People's Right to Information.

Harsh Mander was a Member of the Core Groups on Bonded Labour and Mental Hospitals of the statutory National Human Rights Commission of India; and on various national official National Committees such as those for Social Protection and the Below Poverty Line populations.

Harsh Mander is Founder-Chairperson of the State Health Resource Centre, Chhattisgarh, which established the Mitanin Community Health Programme Archived 20 December 2019 at the Wayback Machine, the forerunner of the Asha Programme, and the Chairperson of INCENSE.

Harsh Mander was appointed a Member of India's National Advisory Council by the council President Sonia Gandhi in June 2010.

Harsh Mander convened the working groups on the Food Security Bill, Land Acquisition and Rehabilitation Bill, Child Labour Abolition, Urban Poverty and Homelessness, Disability Rights, Bonded Labour, Street Vendors and Urban Slums, and co-convened the groups on the Communal and Targeted Violence Bill, Dalits and Minorities and Tribal Rights, among others.

Harsh Mander was among the people who signed the mercy petition of Ajmal Kasab.

Harsh Mander teaches courses on poverty and governance at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, and St Stephen's College, Delhi.

Harsh Mander taught at the Nelson Mandela Centre for Peace and Conflict Resolution at Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi and at the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie while he was Deputy Director of the institution, during which he played a dominant role in the Right to Information Act.

Harsh Mander has lectured at the California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco; the Centre for Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi; Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK; NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad; MIT, Boston; University of California, Los Angeles and at the Universities of Stanford, Washington, Austin, among others.

Harsh Mander has written and co-authored several books and regularly writes columns for newspapers like The Hindu, Hindustan Times and Dainik Bhaskar, and contributes frequently to scholarly journals.

Harsh Mander's stories have been adapted into films such as Shyam Benegal's Samar, and Mallika Sarabhai's dance drama, Unsuni.