Rakshita Swamy

Education

Masters of Science, Social Policy and Development, London School of Economics and Political Science – 2010
Bachelor of Arts, Economics (Honours), Lady Shri Ram College for Women, University of Delhi – 2009

Profile

Rakshita Swamy is a public policy practitioner with over 13 years of experience in conceptualizing, demonstrating and institutionalizing mechanisms of social accountability in the delivery of schemes and functioning of public institutions, at the intersection of Government and Civil Society Organizations. She is the founder and head of Social Accountability Form for Action and Research (SAFAR), where she along with her team work on building rule-based public accountability frameworks in collaboration with Governments and Civil Society Organization. SAFAR works in Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala and Meghalaya and on governance related issues at the national level.

Work Experience

Some of her key positions include:

• Member, Social Audit Advisory Body, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (2020-Present)
• Member, Steering Committee for Social Audits of 14th and 15th Finance Commission Grant, Government of Karnataka (2022- Present)
• Convenor, Ministry of Rural Development and Comptroller and Auditor General of India’s Joint Task Force on Social Audit (2014)
• Faculty Member, International Centre for Information Systems and Audit (iCISA) (Training Centre of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India) on subject of Social Audit and Accountability (2013-14)
• Member of National Resource Group (CSOs and GoI representatives) to support Government of Bhutan to define a social accountability framework for their rural development programmes (2013)
• Member, Task Force constituted by the Department of Personnel and Training, GoI for recommending measures to improve implementation of Section 4 of the RTI Act (2010)
• Honorary Member, Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (2010-Present)
• Member, Soochna Evum Rozgar Adhikar Abhiyan (2010- Present)
• Member, Peoples’ Action for Employment Guarantee (PAEG) (2010- Present)
• Member, Working Committee, National Campaign for Peoples’ Right to Information (NCPRI) (2010- Present)

Publications

Rakshita writes opinion pieces on contemporary issues related to public accountability in the Indian Express, the Hindu, India Forum, Ideas for India, Outlook etc. She along with Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey have edited a book ‘We the People- Establishing Rights and Deepening Democracy; published by Penguin Random House in 2020. She has also written papers on the conceptual framework of social accountability for the Accountability Research Centre, Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability, Common Cause and others.