Alumni Feature | Buddappagari Manaswini, Master’s in Public Policy ‘23

Born and raised in Hyderabad, Manaswini has an undergraduate degree in Genetics, Chemistry and Microbiology from St. Ann’s Degree College for Women. Manaswini was an avid quizzer during her college days and she participated in multiple inter-college quiz competitions. She was the President of the Rotaract Club of St. Ann’s Degree College and the Public Relations Secretary of the Student Council. Her experience volunteering with Make A Difference, UNICEF and Awaaz-e-Telangana Fellowship motivated her to work in the development sector.

She decided to pursue the Master’s in Public Policy from the National Law School of India University because she thought it would be of value to understand how theory meets practice. She found that courses like ‘Politics and Society in India’, ‘Introduction to Public Policy’, ‘Transformative Constitutionalism’, ‘Rights, Duties and Institutions’ helped provide the theoretical foundation that is required to understand policies and policy context. In addition to these courses, she found ‘Urban and Regional Planning’, ‘Citizenship Beyond Constitution’ and ‘Public Health Policies’, which were offered as electives, critical to improve her understanding of the existing policy climate.

Her volunteering experience with UNICEF made her inclined towards WASH sector and pursuing that interest, for Client Led Project, she interned with Bremen Overseas Research and Development Association (BORDA) where she worked on a report titled ‘Enabling and Hindering Condition for Municipal Water & Sanitation Services in Small Towns: Public Policy Environment – A case study of India’. She also interned with Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy and worked with City Leadership Program (CLP).

She was selected to be a part of the Unleash Global Innovation Lab – India, and was one among 1000 global talents selected from a pool of 19000 applicants from over 100 countries. She was part of the SDG-6 which is Clean water and Sanitation for all. Her team worked on designing a modified mechanised tri-wheeler for safe emptying and transportation of faecal sludge from septic tanks in Nachole municipality in Bangladesh for which her team won the “Most Innovative Solution Award”.

Manaswini’s main areas of interest are Water & Sanitation, Public Health and Urban Planning and Governance