top of page
Know your trainers
Sobia Rafiq
Urban Planner and Waste Specialist
Sobia is an Urban Development Professional and co-founder of Sensing Local with 10+ years of experience. She has anchored several innovative projects with respect to Sustainable Mobility, Waste Management, Public Space Design, Water Management and Governance. She is committed to solving complex environmental issues in Indian Cities, which has led to her working with a variety of actors ranging from city municipalities and state-level government bodies to private organisations and local communities.
Nikita Harikishan
Architect and Water Specialist
Nikita is an ecological designer, with over 8 years of experience in natural building, permaculture and participatory design. With a keen interest in water sustainability and nature-based solutions, she works on the design for rainwater harvesting and wastewater systems. As a researcher at Biome Trust, her work involves the understanding of Integrated Urban Water Management, with specific focus on the reuse of treated wastewater as a climate mitigation strategy.
Ankit Bhargava
Architect and Urban Planner
Ankit is an architect and urban planner, and the co-founder of Sensing Local, with 12+ years of experience in spatial planning, urban governance, and architecture projects. His core interest is in how we can disrupt the development trajectory of Indian cities that perpetuate environmental exploitation and deepen socio-economic inequalities. Primarily his practice revolves around using systems thinking and participatory processes to unpack complex problems.
Rahul Srikrishna
Architect and Landscape Specialist
Rahul Srikrishna (RS) is an architect with over 10 years of experience. He is the founder of The HULL, a practice incepted as a platform for design investigation in the realms of Architecture, Landscape Architecture & Urbanism, Interior and Graphic Design. The HULL strives to find relevancy in design solutions through the juxtaposition of history and present, to derive patterns that dictate approaches for the efficient, sustainable, and holistic development of the wider area for the future.
Naveen Kumar G T
Urban Planner and GIS Specialist
Naveen is an Urban Planner with over 5 years' experience, who is passionate about exploring the applicability of GIS based tools for solving local civic issues. At Sensing Local he has developed digital processes for collecting, analysing, and visualising non-spatial and spatial data through effective field investigations, surveys, and research. His interest in working with digital software's and surveying tools has allowed him to be a key contributor in arriving at strategies for conducting effective digital surveys.
Aishwarya Soni
Architect and Sustainable Mobility Specialist
Aishwarya Soni is a Deputy Manager—Strategic & Visual Communications at ITDP India, an organisation that partners with national, state, and city governments to create high-quality walking, cycling, and public transport systems in Indian cities.
In her role, Aishwarya strategises campaigns and creates communication products for various stakeholders—through data stories, blogs, explainers, publications, infographics, and videos—to create awareness about issues and developments around sustainable mobility. She has also been involved in creating frameworks for surveys and data visualisations.
Preethi Raj
Civil Engineer and GIS Specialist
Preethi is a GIS Trainer with over 15 years’ experience in training and academics. Her expertise is in combining strategies and mapping techniques to locate, visualize and design practical solutions for given civic issues. She is a partner at Eco Spatial Research Technologies, where she has created and conducted personalized training modules for people across the globe in various fields like Geology, Architecture, Urban Planning and Environmental Sciences.
Aparna Desrajurs
Active Citizen and Waste Champion
Aparna is a Malleswaram resident, with a fascination for all things kasa (waste)! She has been one of the founding members of Malleswaram Social (set up 6 years back), a citizen group working on civic issues in their neighbourhood. Over the years, she has been anchoring various activities related to Solid Waste Management in her neighbourhood, which has helped her develop a nuanced understanding of the workings of the system.
Nithya Gowda
Urban Planner
Nithya is an Urban planner with experience in planning policy implementation at local governments in Melbourne, Australia. She is interested in making cities and places greener with more practical planning. Nithya is a GIS enthusiast who enjoys learning, practicing, and working with this program. She has also tried her hand at Python programming and has been awestruck by the endless possibilities of AI. Nithya wants to incorporate all her interests in her work to create greener places.
Anusha Bellapu
Aspiring Urbanist and GIS Specialist
As an architect, she worked with Mathew and Ghosh architects on the design and construction of residential, commercial hospitality and public projects. She was an Urban Fellow at IIHS where she examined cities through the economic, socio-political, and regulatory lens in relation to (un)planned geographies. Through a wide array of skills, including ethnographic methods, quantitative analysis, and geospatial mapping, she is equipped to engage with the urban environment in greater complexity.
bottom of page