Meet The Team
Urvashi Butalia
Managing Trustee, Research Director
Urvashi Butalia co-founded Kali for Women in 1984 and in 2003, Zubaan. With over 35 years of experience in feminist and independent publishing, she has a formidable reputation in the industry in India and abroad. She also has a long involvement in the women’s movement in India, and is a well-known writer, both in academia and in the literary world. She has several works to her credit, key among which is her path-breaking study of Partition, The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India which won the Oral History Book Association Award and the Nikkei Asia Award for Culture. She has also taught publishing for over 20 years and is on the advisory boards of a number of national and international organisations. She has received many awards, among which are the Pandora award for women’s publishing, the French Chevalier des Artes et des Lettres and the Padma Shree, the highest civilian honour awarded by the Indian government.
Aanchal Seema Khulbe
Manager-Programmes and Media Archive
Aanchal Seema Khulbe is a queer feminist researcher, activist, and artist. She holds an M.Phil. in Gender Studies and is deeply committed to advancing justice for women and queer communities, with a particular focus on creating accessible shelter spaces globally. Her work sits at the intersection of queer politics, restorative justice, law, film studies, and material memory—an eclectic mix that brings a nuanced, interdisciplinary lens to representation, accountability and community care. She is heard saying “the act of love is as political as it is intimate” on more occasions that you would expect.
Aniket Raj Singh
Finance Associate
Aniket is a Finance Associate with over 2.5 years of experience in the finance industry. Prior to his current role, he completed three years of articleship training under a Chartered Accountant (CA), gaining hands-on experience in auditing, taxation, and accounting. Aniket holds a Master’s degree in Commerce and has cleared Group One of the Intermediate level of the CA exams. Outside of work, Aniket has a passion for music and enjoys long bike rides—having once completed a ride of over 450KM in a single day! He believes in never wasting any food. His love for travel, adventure and continuous learning inspires both his personal and professional growth.
Bidisha Mahanta
Executive Director
Bidisha has a (barely used) bachelor’s degree in law and a master’s in development and labour studies from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She is a feminist researcher, with a focus on gender, citizenship, conflict and peacebuilding, disability and more, with a decade of experience working with women’s groups and collectives, especially focused in Northeast India. Bidisha serves a board member of WAYVE, which works with young people from Dalit, Bahujan, Adivasi, Tribal and religious minority communities. She is currently editing a volume on women, queer, trans and nonbinary persons experiences of belonging in Northeast India through visual research practices and has an upcoming chapter on conflict, peacebuilding, citizenship and gender in an edited volume on Critical Feminist Approaches To Peace & Conflict Studies, as a part of the Edinburgh Feminist Studies on Peace, Violence and Justice series published by Edinburgh University Press. She’s a true khar-khua axomiya and makes a mean smoked pork curry with bhut jolokia and lai xaak, when she’s not feeling too exasperated with her cats (and the world, in general).
Elsy Paul
Administrative Assistant
Elsy has been a committed employee with Kali, and then Zubaan for over twenty-two years. She manages to be Zubaan’s secretary, bookkeeper and receptionist all at the same time! She very grudgingly agrees to give discounts, occasionally.
Indira Tayeng
Project Associate
Indira Tayeng is a researcher focusing on statelessness in South Asia’s Himalayan Borderlands.
With a profound interest in exploring the concept of belonging, she delves into the complexities of
identity, gendered roles, displacement, citizenship and migration. As an avid seeker of new
experiences and perspectives, she intends to bring out the narratives of the borderland lives and
aspire to make a difference by telling their stories. Beyond her academic pursuits, she finds solace
in the company of her two beloved cats, Ron and Miyoko, who hold a special place in her heart.
Satish Sharma
Head of Finance
Satish has over thirty years of experience working in non-government organizations. He has been with Kali and then Zubaan for seventeen years. He manages the finance and accounts of various projects undertaken by Zubaan, as well as contributes a lot to the unhindered functioning of the office space. He can also manage a mean backhand in badminton and give players younger than him a run for their money.
Divya Kandukuri
Senior Projects Associate
Divya Kandukuri is a journalist by training and founder of a Phule-Ambedkarite mental health collective, The Blue Dawn. The Blue Dawn is a community initiative working by values of community healing and social justice and a facilitator of accessible mental health care services to people coming from caste and ethnic marginalities. Divya is also a trainer who has been working with social workers, media professionals, and mental health professionals to bring conversations on the caste system into their practices. Her work lies around the intersections of Caste, Gender, Pop Culture and Mental Health. When not doing boring work on her laptop, she is a full time dog mom and an avid horror movie-watcher and wishes to see the world free of prejudice.
Tenzin Choedon
Project Consultant
Tenzin, a Tibetan residing in Dharamshala, began her career at Drokmo, a Tibetan feminist organisation championing gender equity, serving as a Program Officer and researcher. Subsequently, she ventured into independent consulting, specialising in facilitation and research. Her research interests revolve around Gender, Minority and Tibet Studies. She also embarked on a personal creative journey, crafting “The Quiet Solace of Sunset,” a humble exploration into the world of filmmaking. Tenzin is a passionate lifelong learner, eager to grow and one day return to her origin in Tibet.
Thingnam Anjulika Samom
Project Consultant (Cultures of Peace)
Thingnam Anjulika Samom is an independent researcher who dabbles with translation of Manipuri literature into English. She also undertakes independent research and documentation work, the most recent being collecting Manipuri women’s narratives of the Second World War. She has contributed to various publications and also edited Crafting The Word: Women’s Writings from Manipur which was published by Zubaan, New Delhi in 2019.
Usha
Chef
Usha is an office assistant and our resident cook, and has been working with Zubaan since 2013. She is Young Zubaan’s greatest fan and is slowly and steadily devouring all the children’s books here to improve her English reading and writing skills.
Ishani K B
Project Consultant (No Space For Work)
Ishani KB works on the No Space For Work project and has previously worked on the Sexual Violence and Impunity project and a scoping study on the possibility of setting up a women’s museum in India, for Zubaan. Ishani is also the commissioning editor of the Young Zubaan list for our sister publishing organization. She is often found putting out many fires around the office and trying to teach people traffic rules and pedestrians right of way, outside of the office.
Laxmi Murthy
Project Consultant (No Space For Work)
Laxmi Murthy is a journalist, writer and researcher based in Bangalore. She is contributing editor with Himal Southasian, Colombo, and heads the Hri Institute for Southasian Research and Exchange, Kathmandu. She is passionate about freedom of expression and journalists’ rights and is the editor of the annual IFJ South Asia Press Freedom Report. Laxmi helped co-ordinate the Sexual Violence and Impunity research and publication project at Zubaan, and also the Stepping Stones project, which took forward the research through the performing arts. She is one of the co-founders of the Network of Women in Media, India, and co-founder editor of the Free Speech Collective. After more than three decades in the autonomous women’s movement, she is being taught Feminism 201 by her two daughters.
Vidyun Sabhaney
Project Consultant
Vidyun Sabhaney is a writer and illustrator of graphic narratives and comics. Her work has been published by a number of publishers and magazines, both in India and internationally. She is the co-editor of First Hand, and the editor of First Hand 2, both non-fiction and research-based comics anthologies. She is a co-editor of Drawing Resistance, a bilingual publication with two issues. She also started Captain Bijli Comics, an independent comics publishing platform which created Mice Will Be Mice, DOGS! An Anthology, and the First Hand books (in collaboration with Yoda Press & People Tree). Her latest independent work is a comic on the women of the farmer’s movement titled Haq. She is the co-author of a graphic novel titled ‘Food & Farming’, which will be published by Leftword Books later this year.
