Our Team
Satya Swaroop
Managing Editor
Anil Kumar Sinha
IAS (rtd) | Editor-in-Chief
Anil Kumar Sinha
IAS (rtd) | Editor-in-Chief
Anil Kumar Sinha, IAS (rtd.) is the Hony. Chief Editor, Know Disasters. He has more than 40 years of work experience in the field of disaster management. He has also been the Senior Advisor, Sphere India, Senior Advisor, Centre for Disaster Management, LBS National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie (2017-19). He is also the Founder Vice Chairman, Bihar State Disaster Management Authority (BSDMA), Patna, Founder Executive Director, National Institute of Disaster Management (NIDM), Govt. of India, New Delhi , and Founder Programme Advisor, International Recovery Platform/UNDP, Kobe, Japan.
Akanksha Pandey
Editor
Akanksha Pandey
Editor
Akanksha Pandey is a Disaster Risk Management Enthusiast and Researcher. She has worked with national and international organizations in India, Bangladesh and Thailand on the various aspects of disasters and governance issues. She is a strong advocate of mainstreaming DRR (disaster risk reduction) in to development policies, planning and practices and has done research, presented and published papers on the issue in various journals.
Her interest lies in Disaster Risk Governance, Nature Conservation, Resilience Building, Risk Communication, Disasters and Development, Research and Capacity Building.
She holds Masters of Arts (M.A.) & Masters of Philosophy (M.Phil.) degrees in Disaster Studies from Jamsetji Tata School of Disaster Studies (JTSDS), Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai. She is also perusing Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D) on ‘Flood Risk Governance’ from the same institute.
As Know Disasters Magazine’s Editor she leads the magazine towards Resilience Building efforts for the benefit of the Common Vulnerable Masses by Demystifying, Simplifying and Distributing the knowledge of Disaster Management.
She also enjoys travelling, reading, adventure sports, music and fact-based cinema.
Advisors
Dr Sunita Reddy
Advisor
Dr Sunita Reddy
Advisor
Dr. Sunita Reddy is an Associate Professor at Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health , School of Social Sciences, JNU, New Delhi. She is also the Deputy Director (R&D) at Jawaharlal Nehru University and an Adjunct Faculty at Special Centre for Disaster Research, JNU. She has authored several articles and two books:
1. ‘Clash of Waves: Post Tsunami Relief and Rehabilitation in Andaman and Nicobar Islands’ Indos 2012,
2. Editor of ‘Marginalisation in Globalising Delhi: Issues of Land, Livelihood and Health’ Springers 2016, 3. Editor The Asian Tsunami and Post Disaster Aid, Springer 2018,
She is also the Founder Chairperson – Anthropos India Foundation and President (Hon.) SATAT.
Vandana Chauhan
Advisor
Vandana Chauhan
Advisor
Ms. Vandana Chauhan believes that community voices should be incorporated into local disaster planning through various participatory methods which make the community equal partners. Doing so leads to better planning. She is currently implementing such approaches in Bihar, Odisha, and Jammu and Kashmir, Gujarat, and Assam with local communities, District Collectorates, municipalities, CBOs, municipal corporations, District, State and National Disaster Management Authorities.
She also led the study to find community livelihood recovery after 9 years of tsunami affected communities in Tamilnadu. She was also one of the team members of study on Long Term Recovery following 1993 Latur Earthquake led by Dr. Ian Davis and Mr. Mihir R. Bhatt.
Col Sanjay Srivastav
Advisor
Col Sanjay Srivastav
Advisor
He leads Climate Resilient Observing-Systems Promon Council CROPC which is an organization formed to bridge the gap in impact based weather, climate change and pollution information services, policy advocacy , lateral use of climatology in agriculture, industries, health, education and tourism etc.
He has several years of work experience in the field of DRR and expertise is Disaster Management – Early Warning, Communication, capacity building, Lightning forecast and safe zones, Climate Change , risk assessment, teaching , advisory and policy interventions.
Dr Madhu Bala
Advisor
Dr Madhu Bala
Advisor
Dr. Madhu Bala is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Mirza Ghalib College,Gaya, Bihar. She holds a Ph.D on ‘Political Dimensions of Poverty with reference to Post Independent Bihar’ from Patna University. She has 20 years of work experience in the field of sustainability and disaster management.
Editorial Team
Dr. Anand Bijeta
Atul Tripathi
Abhinav Walia
Field Correspondents
Komal Priya Singh
Field Correspondent
Altamash Khan
Field Correspondent, KDM cum, DRM Professional
Altamash Khan
Field Correspondent, KDM cum, DRM Professional
Altamash Khan holds an M.Sc degree in Disaster Management & Climate Sustainability from
Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. He is also a Gold medalist in Diploma in Disaster Management
and the award was conferred to him by the President of India, Mr. Ramnath Kovind, Guest of
Honor during the then university’s convocation in October 2019.
He is a young and passionate Disaster Risk Management Professional who has worked with
organizations like Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC) and Sphere India.
Currently he is working as a Program Coordinator at Sphere India for it’s Collaborative
Advocacy vertical where he advocates with government, UN agencies, donors, funders, CSOs,
private sectors about the humanitarian needs of people during emergencies. He is also the
Bihar State coordinator for the same organization.
He contributes as a Field Correspondent for the Know Disasters Magazine, for which he writes
articles and collects field stories on Disaster Management. He possess Research and
Documentation experiences while working on training modules for EOC functionaries;
Handbook on Disaster Management for Anganwadi Workers, Emergency Preparedness
Response Handbooks on Multi-Sector Coordination for 6 sectors; Module on Ecosystem based
DRR; Animal Protection in Emergencies etc. He has also been involved with NIDM while
working on these handbooks and modules.
He had actively worked in the State Emergency Operation Center (SEOC), Health Emergency
Operation Center (HEOC) of Govt.of Bihar during the initial wave of Covid-19.
His area of interests include Early Warning Systems, Community based DRR, Village Disaster
Management Plans, Media Advocacy etc.
He is a passionate cricketer. He runs a community cricket academy for the underprivileged
children with help of crowdfunding. He loves video making, handling social media platforms.
Fariha
Field Correspondent
Fariha
Field Correspondent
Fariha is a Hardworking GIS professional. She completed her M.Sc in Disaster Management
and Climate sustainability studies and one year PG Diploma in Digital Cartography from Jamia
Millia Islamia.She completed one more Post Graduation in Rural Development from IGNOU.She
pursued Master in Business Administration from IGNOU.
She worked in private and public sector organizations during her studies.She worked in Central
Railway information system as a GIS trainee, Forest Survey of India (MOEF), Dehradun as a
Dissertation summer intern, Indian Research Academy as a Research Associate and Genesis
Ray Energy Pvt Ltd. as a GIS Intern.
She actively worked on Utility services, Asset Management Systems, Forest Fires and climate
change analyzing studies, expansion and development of rural-urban settlements, Social
economic studies, Geospatial studies, Urban drainage, and impact on vulnerable society.
She is working as Field correspondent for Know Disasters Magazine. Her responsibilities are to
manage databases of different stakeholders. She writes articles for magazines through field
surveys. She is currently working as GIS Associate in Genesis Ray Energy Pvt. Ltd.
She likes watching Anime and is fond of poetry writing.
Designer
Hemant Kolambe
Santosh Nawar
Coordinator
Arvinder Kaur Sethi