Dr. Reetika Syal is an Assistant Professor at the Centre for Research in Social Sciences and Education, JAIN (Deemed-to-be) University, Bangalore since 2013. She completed her Ph.D in Political Science in 2013 from the Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bangalore, and her thesis title was ‘Civil Society and Inclusive Governance: Delivery of Elementary Education in Madhya Pradesh’. She was also Post-Doctoral Fellow at IIT- Delhi and Wageningen University, The Netherlands in 2018-19, where she worked on a project related to Civil Society Advocacy with her research focusing on State-Civil Society Relations in Disaster Management in India. She presented the findings of her study at three international conferences at International Institute for Social Studies, The Hague, Netherlands, Uppsala University, Sweden, and at Wales Institute of Social and Economics Research, Data and Methods (WISERD), Aberystwyth, U.K.

She has been teaching Political Science, Public Administration and Public Policy related courses to Graduate, Post- Graduate and Doctoral Scholars at JAIN, along with courses on Research Methods and Quantitative Data Analysis to the Doctoral Scholars. She is also a resource person for Faculty Development Program at JAIN. She has also been invited as a guest lecturer to various colleges and universities in Bangalore. She has been a part of Lokniti Network for various elections and democracy related studies and is presently the co-coordinator for Karnataka for the Network. She has also been a resource person for Lokniti’s Annual Summer School on Quantitative Data Analysis at JAIN.

Dr. Syal has presented papers at many international and national conferences, and has also published in journals and in edited books. She was invited as a participant at the Brown International Advanced Research Institute, at Brown University, U.S.A in 2016. Dr. Syal was the International Consultant for the Nepal Governance Survey, a study by the Nepal Planning Commission. 

Publications:

Book Chapters

• (With Sandeep Shastri) ‘The Modi Factor in 2014’, in Electoral Politics in India: The Resurgence of Bharatiya Janata Party, Suhas Palshikar, Sanjay Kumar and Sanjay Lodha (eds), Routledge India Publications, February 2017
• (With  Sandeep  Shastri,  Suhas  Palshikar  and  Shreya  Sarawgi)  ‘South  Asia:  An  Arm’s  Length Embrace of Democracy’ in Growing Up Democratic: Does it Make a Difference?, Robert Mattes, David Denemark and Richard G. Niemi (eds), Lynne Rienner Publishers, July 2016
• ‘Decentralisation and Civil Society: Elementary Education Delivery in Madhya Pradesh’ in Democratic Decentralisation in India-Experiences, Issues and Challenges, E. Venkatesu (ed), Routledge Publications, India, June 2016.
• (With Chetan B.S and Manisha M) ‘Challenges in Higher Education: Interpreting Quality in the Context of Expansion in Indian Higher Education’, in Higher Education: Between Quality and Reservation, Dinesha P.T and Ramesh (eds), Kalpaz Publications, Delhi, 2013

Research Papers

• ‘Good Governance Through E-Governance in Karnataka’ in International Journal of Research in Engineering, IT and Social Sciences, ISSN 2250-0588, Volume 08 Issue 1, pp 26-33, January 2018 (with Menaka Thammaiah D)
• ‘Understanding Popular Perceptions of Democracy: Findings from the State of Democracy in South Asia Study and World Values Survey’ in Chanakya- Journal of Political Science at Karnatak University, ISSN No.: 2348-8298, Vol 1,2,3 No.2,3,4 2016, pp 3-23 (with Sandeep Shastri)
• ‘Does Urbanisation Matter? Determining the Political Behaviour of an Urban Voter’ in  Punjab University Research Journal of Social Sciences, Vol 22, No. 2, 2014
• Leadership in Context: Impact of Leadership in the 2014 Lok Sabha Elections’, in Economic and Political Weekly, Vol XLIX, No. 39, pp. 77-81, 2014 (with Sandeep Shastri)
• ‘Sheher ka Rujhan’ (Hindi article), in Pratiman: Samay, Samaaj, Sanskriti, Vol 2, Issue 1, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi, pp. 195-200, 2014
• ‘What are the Effects of Educational Mobility on Political Interest and Participation in the Indian Electorate’, Asian Survey, Vol. 52, Number 2, March-April, University of California Press, pp. 423-439, 2012
• ‘Civil  Society  Organisations  and  Delivery  of  Elementary  Education  in  Madhya  Pradesh:  An Empirical Analysis’, Working Paper No. 268, Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bangalore, 2011

Newspaper Articles

• ‘Sarkari Pradarshan: Naagrik Mulyankan ke nihitarth’ (in Hindi), Rashtriya Sahara, 5th  May 2018, Bengaluru (with Priyanca Mathur Velath)
• ‘Implications  of  citizen  evaluation  of  government’s  performance’,  Deccan  Chronicle,  24th   April 2018, Bengaluru (with Priyanca Mathur Velath)
• ‘Only one-fourth happy with Siddu’s stint’, Deccan Chronicle, 24th  April 2018, Bengaluru (with Priyanca Mathur Velath)
• ‘Bhagyas  to  keep  CM’s  future  bright’,  Deccan  Chronicle,  8th   May  2018  (with  Priyanca  Mathur Velath)
• ‘The UPA II Report Card’, The Hindu, 6th June 2014