overview

• Professor Sumeet Mhaskar is Labour Sociologist at the Jindal School of Government and Public Policy, O. P. Jindal Global University. He also holds a Research Partner position at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity (MPI-MMG) in Germany.  Prof. Mhaskar has previously held positions at the Center for South Asia (Stanford University), Centre for Modern Indian Studies (University of Göttingen), International Centre for Development and Decent Work (Kassel University) and MPI-MMG. He received the prestigious postdoctoral research award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany. He obtained his doctorate in Sociology from the University of Oxford and M. A. and M.Phil. degrees in Political Science from Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.

   

  Prof. Mhaskar’s research explores the multifaceted vulnerabilities workers’ experience at the lower end of India’s ‘rising economy’. His research interest in deindustrialisation, joblessness, return migration, role of caste, religion and gender in shaping occupational choices, urban spatial restructuring, and labour and social movements. He is currently finalising his book manuscript on Mumbai's textile mill workers' responses to their job loss following the closure of textile mills. In addition to his work on Mumbai textile mill workers, he is working on projects that looks at (a) the urban experience of the rural labour migrants in Mumbai city, (b) the impact on COVID-19 on the Indian middle-class and their responses to the crisis, (c) COVID-19 and the crisis of “gulf dream” for the Kerala migrant workers, (d) COVID-19 Pandemic and its Influences on the Political and Social Aspects, and the Psychological Perceptions, and (e) the Maratha caste mobilisations for affirmative actions or reservations in employment and higher education in the 21st Century Maharashtra.

   

  Prof. Mhaskar’s writings have been published in peer-reviewed journals, edited books, working papers, newspapers, and magazines. He also runs a digitization centre in Mumbai where old and rare documents on social and political movements are digitised. The International Institute of Social History, Amsterdam gave this project's initial funding. The Centre funds it for Modern Indian Studies, University of Göttingen.