There are days when I absolutely love spending time with our subscribers. Hearing their stories about things that excite them; problems that they are trying to solve for. And sharing what we do at The Ken, and how we go about doing it. Days like today.
Antaraa Vasudev is one amongst the thousands of subscribers we have. She is the founder of Civis, an organisation that wants to build constructive dialogue amongst citizens on issues that should matter to them. So, if the government has asked for public comments on a new policy, Civis hopes to get conversations going. Pushing for better governance isn’t the easiest problem to solve. “I can list out the problems for you.” That’s Vasudev speaking, and we are talking about building a team. “Getting people is a challenge. So we need to find developers, and work with them to build a product through which we can reach out to people. And on the other hand, we need people who understand governance, like public policy experts, lawyers, people who I can’t afford to get on board full-time. It’s a constant challenge.” Vasudev has been at it for the last seven months.
It is on days like these that I’m glad for the team we have here. One more addition to it.
Gayathri Vaidyanathan joins us today. She writes on health, environment and science. Gayathri has reported and produced stories for the Washington Post, Discover, Nature, and the New York Times, amongst other publications. In her last assignment, she was the lead science writer for E&E News in Washington, D.C. E&E News is a news organisation focused on energy and the environment. Over the past decade, Gayathri has travelled across North America, Africa and Asia on long-form reporting projects. She has a master’s in journalism from Columbia University and a bachelor’s in biochemistry from McMaster University in Ontario. At The Ken, Gayathri will write on healthcare, the pharmaceutical business and the environment. Based in Bengaluru, you can reach her at gayathri at the rate the-ken.com
