Biography

My research is on trans-national migration, migrant groups and their relationship to social and political change in the twentieth century, with a special focus on South Asia. I explore the dialogic relationship between diverse strategies employed by migrants to negotiate change and displacement, and state-led governmentalities of sedentarisation, resettlement and rehabilitation.
In 2009 I completed my doctoral thesis titled ‘Refugees and the Politics of Nation Building in India, 1947-71’, at the University of Cambridge. My thesis studied the rehabilitation of East Pakistani refugees in India as a prism through which state-society interaction in post-independence India becomes visible. Methodologically, I combine oral and archival sources, juxtaposing refugee reminiscences with government reports and surveys.
As a Max Weber Fellow, I intend to revise my thesis for publication as a monograph. I have recently begun researching India’s position as a safe haven and clearing house for European refugees fleeing conflict during World War II and I hope to utilize my time in Florence to further develop this project.
I am at present awaiting the publication of an article exploring refugee memory in the Andaman Islands in a collected volume entitled ‘Refugees and the End of Empire: Imperial Collapse and Forced Migration during the Twentieth Century’, (forthcoming, Palgrave Macmillan).
I am currently teaching ‘British Empire in India and Historical Methods’ at the International History Department of the London School of Economics as a Guest Teacher. I also work as a Guest Lecturer at the University of Cambridge, offering a series of lectures on Migration and Society in South Asia.