Bela Bhatia is an independent writer and human rights lawyer working in the District courts of Bastar division, south Chhattisgarh, India.
Prior to turning to academics, she was a full-time rights activist for nearly a decade in a sangathan (collective) of landless agricultural labourers and marginal farmers in Bhiloda taluka of Sabarkantha district (Gujarat) and in autonomous movements for peace and justice in Iraq and Palestine.
She first came to Bastar in 2006 when she began studying the ongoing war between the Indian state and the Communist Party of India (Maoist) and continued to visit regularly in the following years.
[1][2] She has been an Associate Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi and an Honorary Professor at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Bombay.
She is co-author (with Mary Kawar and Mariam Shahin) of Unheard Voices: Iraqi Women on War and Sanctions (London: Change, 1992), co-editor (with Jean Drèze and Kathy Kelly) of War and Peace in the Gulf: Testimonies of the Gulf Peace Team (London: Spokesman, 2001) and co-author (with other members of the 'expert group' set up by the Planning Commission, Government of India) of 'Development Challenges in Extremist Affected Areas' (2 vols, 2008); the first draft of this report was written by K. Balagopal and herself.