PRIZES
For The Incarcerations: BK16 and the Search for Democracy in India:
Winner of the Times of India AutHER Award, 2025
Finalist for the Orwell Prize for Political Writing, 2024.
Finalist for the Moore Human Rights Prize, 2025.
Longlisted for the Karwaan Book Award, 2025.
Book of the Year for The New Statesman, The Hindu and Hindustan Times 2024
Financial Times ‘What to Read in 2024 List’
Winner of 2022 ERC Public Engagement with Research Prize across the natural and social sciences.
For Nightmarch: Among India’s Revolutionary Guerrillas:
Winner of the Association for Political and Legal Anthropology Book Prize, 2020.
Finalist for the Orwell Prize for Political Writing, 2019.
Shortlist for the Victor Turner Prize in Ethnographic Writing, 2019.
Finalist for the New India Foundation Book Prize, 2019.
Longlisted for the Tata Literature Live Non-fiction Award, 2019.
Book of the Year 2018 for the New Statesman, History Workshop, Scroll India and Hong Kong Free Press. Hindu ‘Year in Review Book’ and a Public Anthropology ‘Must Read’.
NAMED LECTURES and KEYNOTES
2026 Eilert Sundt Lecture, University of Oslo
2026 Eric Wolf Lecture, Vienna
2025 International Guest Lecture, Anthropology, Austrian Academy of Science
2025 Joseph Elder Lecture, Keynote of the Association of South Asian Studies conference, Madison
2025 Macgeorge Public Lecture, Melbourne
2024 Keynote Lecture of the Association of Brazilian Anthropologists bi-annual conference, Belo H
2024 Justice and Asia Annual Lecture. University of Notre Dame.
2024 The Firth Lecture, The Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK
2023 The Strathern Lecture, Department of Anthropology, University of Cambridge
2023 The Freedom Lecture, University of Rojava
2022 The Ambedkar Memorial Lecture, Egalitarian Society, India
2022 Keynote Lecture of the Swedish Anthropology Association Annual Conference, Gothenburg.
2021 The David Graeber Memorial Lecture, Consortium of Universities.
2020 Keynote Lecture of Post-University Conference, Central European University, International Relations
2020 Distinguished Lecture of Development and Change at the Development Studies Association Conference, UK.
2019 Plenary Session of Historical Materialism Conference, London.
2019 The Gold Lecture, Anthropology, Goldsmiths, University of London.
2019 The Willem Wertheim Lecture, University of Amsterdam.
2019 Keynote Lecture of the British Association for South Asian Studies, Annual Conference, Durham.
2019 The Opening Lecture of Biennale Democrazia, City of Turin, Italy.
2018 Keynote Lecture Southampton Uni Business School Conf on Indigenous Social Movements & Technology.
2018 Opening Plenary of Millennium Journal, Conference on Revolutions, International Relations.
2017 Silver Jubilee Lecture of Silver Jubilee Conference, Asian Development Research Institute, Patna, Bihar.
2016 Keynote Lecture Conference on Women in Colonial and Postcolonial History. Ranchi University, India.
2016 Opening Plenary of Anthropology in London Day.
2014 Keynote Lecture of Tribal Autonomy Conference. University of Hyderabad, Telangana, India.
2013 Keynote Lecture. Conference on ‘Spaces of Violence in Democracies’. Bielefeld University.
2013 Keynote Lecture. Conference on Economic Growth, Poverty & Resistance. Stockholm University.
2012 The Malinowski Lecture, London School of Economics.
SCHOLARSHIPS, FELLOWSHIPS, GRANTS
2024-2025 The Macgeorge Fellowship, University of Melbourne
2013-2020 European Research Council. Starting Grant. To work on the ‘Underbelly of the Indian Economic Boom.’ Principal Investigator.
2013-2019 Economic and Social Research Council UK. To work on ‘An Ethnographic Investigation into the Persistence of Poverty amongst Adivasis and Dalits in India.’ Principal Investigator.
2011-2012 British Academy UK- South Asia Visiting Fellowship Scheme. UK Host to Visiting Fellow.
2009 – 2012 British Academy UK-South Asia Partnership Grant for ‘Inequality and Affirmative Action in South Asia: Current Experiences and Future Agendas in India and Nepal.’ Principal Collaborator with Co-Investigator Ajay Gudavarthy, Political Science, JNU and Mukta Tamang, Anthropology, Tribhuvan University
2008 – 2011 Economic and Social Research Council Research Fellowship for ‘State, Society, Revolution: Everyday lives and livelihoods of marginalised people in Jharkhand, India.’ Principal Investigator.
2007 British Academy Small Research Grant for ‘Maoism in India and Nepal: Anthropological Comparisons.’ Principal Investigator.
2006 Wenner Gren Richard Carley Hunt Memorial Fellowship for the writing of ‘In the Shadows of the State: Indigenous Politics in Jharkhand, India.’