Bhuvana has 16+ years experience in public policy research, and has worked extensively alongside government and civil society partners on creating an enabling environment for enterprises, regulatory simplification, and reforming welfare programmes. She is the former Director, Research at the Centre for Civil Society, one of India’s leading think tanks. She led the thinking and execution of multiple high-visibility research publications including 100 Laws for Repeal, Doing Business in Delhi, Anatomy of K-12 Governance, Playbook for reforming Indian agriculture, and Regulation for New Realities. She has published several opinion articles on domestic policy in leading pink papers. She is also a faculty at CCS Academy where she delivers lectures and training on new public management and fundamentals of public policy. In her roles with the British Government's Department for International Development and MIT’s Poverty Action Lab she has worked with state governments of Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Punjab. Bhuvana is a member of the GAME Ease of Doing Business Task Force that works to transform the operating environment for small enterprises in select states. She also advises and collaborates with Avantis RegTech, DeAsra, and Pune International Centre on policy and regulatory analysis. Prior to returning to India in 2010, Bhuvana worked in development consulting with Deloitte’s Emerging Markets Group (now Cardno Emerging Markets) and the United Nations. She spent several years in Afghanistan and Sudan working on institution building. Bhuvana graduated with a Bachelor’s in Economics from St Xavier’s in Bombay, and a Master’s from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University where she specialised in development economics.

Publications

1. “How to ensure more women in the workforce” (co-authored). Hindustan Times, 30 April 2022.
2. “The curious case of Indian Working Women” (co-authored). Livemint, 08 March 2022.
3. “State of Discrimination: Sub-national comparison of legal barriers to women’s right to chose work in India”. 08 March 2022.
4. “What can we expect from the labour codes?” (co-authored). TeamLease Regtech, 18 November 2021.
5. “Enabling environment for 'doing business'”. Business Standard, 14 November 2020
6. “Pricing education: An example from Uttar Pradesh” (co-authored). National Institute of Public Finance and Policy Blog, 22 July 2020.
7. “Why farmers are still having to protest for their right to sow GM seeds, even in a pandemic” (co-authored). The Print, 22 June 2020.
8. “Budget 2020: Unleash the entrepreneurial spirit” (co-authored). ETGovernment.com, 1 February, 2020.
9. “How does India Fare on Regulatory Hygiene? Status Check of the Rule-Making Process” (co-authored). Journal of Indian Law and Society, Volume 8, 69-84, 2017.