Alumni Feature | Chitra Rajpal, Master’s in Public Policy ‘21

The 22 year old resilient and ambitious Chitra Rajpal is one of the youngest members of the current MPP cohort. She pursued her undergraduate studies in History from Hansraj College, Delhi University. Her passion for social change was ignited through her involvement with Enactus, a social entrepreneurial non-profit. As part of Enactus, Chitra and her team founded Project Aangan under which they established several crèches across Delhi NCR. The creches served as a daycare and educational facility for over 70 children of construction site workers, as well as a training centre for young women entrepreneurs. The project bagged the first runners up position at the prestigious Hult Prize at the national level.Simultaneously, Chitra was also involved with a Delhi-based NGO called Kitaab Club wherein she paved her way from a volunteer position to one of leadership. In her own words, “The most enriching experience with the NGO was the month-long teaching stint in a remote town of Uttarakhand called Devikhet. The fieldwork was an eye-opener towards the public policy issues of education and governance.” The coming together of her undergraduate experiences led her to the Masters in Public Policy course at NLSIU. A firm believer in the power of grassroots movements, Chitra completed her fieldwork in Rajasthan with the Mazdoor Kisaan Shakti Sangathan. There she conducted a social audit in Bhim district, uncovering the corrupt nexus of government and middlemen in the implementation of the Building and Other Construction Workers Act. Her policy inclination towards governance issues bagged her a research and advocacy internship role with Aam Aadmi Party, Karnataka. The research findings of the internship were utilised to shape the municipal election campaign of the party in Bengaluru. She has also interned with the Ola Mobility Centre, where she studied and drafted a report based on the principles of circular economy and asset sharing. Recently, she worked with Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy and developed end-to-end e-learning strategies for its Civic Learning vertical. The e-learning tools are slated to be implemented in schools all across Bengaluru. With a penchant for writing, Chitra has also been published with the Mountain Ink Magazine and the Armchair Journal, among others.