Shrinivas Rao is Associate Director at Embark Advisors Private Limited and part of senior management team. He spearheads the Development Consulting division of company. Shrinivas is a senior professional and provided consultancy to multi lateral and bilateral funding agencies in India. He has deep understanding of city development, city planning and governance structure in India. He has substantial experience of building team, managing professionals and business development. As champion of participatory planning and research, he has implemented projects of participatory town planning, leadership development academies for elected leaders of local government and advised government on key governance reforms. He has published several articles on governance reforms, city planning, participatory development and leadership building in national and international journals. He is also a director of Azad Foundation, which concentrates on livelihood programs for urban poor.

Shrinivas was State Head - Chhattisgarh, of Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), a reputed organization in this sector. He initiated the participatory town planning in two towns of Chhattisgarh and advised state government on urban development policy and municipal governance reforms. Shrinivas in capacity of technical advisor to the state government prepared guiding principles of activity mapping for devolution of fund, function and functionaries to the local governments. Shrinivas was the team member of national study on municipal finance conducted by PRIA in 2007.

In 2007 he joined Aagaz Foundation, “The centre for women leadership” as senior programme team member. He played a key role in operations of seven Aagaz Academies in five states of India. These academies train elected women leaders on various governance issues such as local government systems, micro planning and conflict resolution. Shrinivas was Head of ‘South Asian Initiative’ of Aagaz Foundation where it worked closely with civil society organizations of five neighboring countries to reform local governance and women leadership in the region. Shrinivas has worked closely with Norwegian Association of regional and local Authorities (K.S.) to strengthen municipal gender training components.

Shrinivas has widely travelled to present papers in international forums on participatory city planning, governance reform, leadership development and participatory citizenship. He is an M.Phil. (Economics) from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) New Delhi.

Shrinivas may be reached at e-mail id shrinivas.rao@embarkgroup.com and mobile number +91 9873594383.