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September 2008
Business & Human Rights Resource Centre is pleased to announce the appointment of Surabhi Chopra as its first South Asia Researcher & Representative, based in New Delhi. She will begin work on 1 October, drawing attention to the human rights impacts of companies in the region; highlighting under-reported cases and concerns raised by civil society; seeking company responses to alleged abuses; and building contacts with NGOs, companies, journalists and government representatives. The establishment of our South Asia post was made possible by a grant from Network for Social Change. 225 candidates applied for the position and eight were interviewed; the applicants were of a very high calibre.
About Surabhi Chopra
Surabhi is an Indian human rights advocate and lawyer based in Delhi. Born and raised in Delhi, she is a graduate of:
- Harvard University (B.A. Honours, magna cum laude)
- London School of Economics (MSc. in Human Rights, with Distinction – ranked 1st in year)
- Cambridge University (Law degree, First Class, Jennings Prize for Academic Excellence in Law, Sir David Williams Prize for Excellence in Public Law)
Following graduation from Harvard, Surabhi worked briefly for a management consulting firm in Boston, before returning to India where she worked for:
- South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre, Delhi (Volunteer Researcher)
- UNICEF, Delhi (Consultant)
- Action Aid India, Delhi (Research Associate - worked with marginalised communities, including homeless persons, sex workers and bonded labourers, to improve their access to welfare programmes and the judicial system; researched access to legal aid and rehabilitation for women in custodial institutions)
Surabhi worked at Human Rights Watch as a Volunteer Researcher in the Women’s Rights Division, where she contributed to monitoring women’s political participation in the 2004 Afghanistan elections.
More recently she worked as a Summer Associate at Kamal Hossain & Associates in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where her work included researching the efficacy of public interest litigation in Bangladesh, and drafting judicial review applications challenging illegal construction and land acquisition by the state.
In 2006-07 she was a trainee at Took Chambers, a leading civil liberties barristers’ chambers in London, where she represented clients in asylum, youth, criminal, and employment cases, and did legal research and drafting in international and constitutional cases, including litigation in the European Court of Human Rights and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.
Surabhi is currently self-employed practising law in the Delhi High Court. She is fluent in English and Hindi, and speaks Punjabi.
Her publications include:
- “Right to Food in Bangladesh”, Human Rights in Bangladesh 2005, Hossain, Hameeda (ed).
- Contributor to “Abandoned and Betrayed: Afghan Refugees under UNHCR Protection in New Delhi”, Nov 1999, South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre
On the reasons why she applied for this post, Surabhi says:
“In South Asia burgeoning business opportunities seem to dominate in the media, in middle class conversation, and increasingly in state pronouncements and policy. In the meantime, a majority of South Asians live in chronic, grinding poverty that is taken for granted. A disproportionate number of the poorest in the region belong to dalit communities, religious minorities, and marginalised tribes - they face discrimination that intensifiies their experience of poverty and often excludes them from education and work opportunities. They are also increasingly displaced by industrial projects and special economic zones..
The intense focus on business and economic growth has shifted attention and political rhetoric away from the concerns of the most vulnerable. I am eager to work with the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre because it would be an opportunity to carve out space for human rights, and make common cause with actors within civil society, government and the corporate sector to secure this space. I value the opportunity to be part of a team that draws attention to the complex human rights issues created by growth and inequality.”
About our regional researchers
Surabhi is our fourth part-time regional researcher, joining:
- Roddy Shaw Kwok-wah, East Asia Researcher, based in Hong Kong
- Abiola Okpechi, Anglophone Africa Researcher, based in South Africa
- Ella Skybenko, Eastern Europe/Central Asia Researcher, based in Ukraine
Later this year we will appoint a Francophone Africa Researcher (based in Senegal). We are now seeking funds to establish regional researchers in Latin America and the Middle East. Our international network of researchers makes the conduct of companies more transparent, promotes accountability and positive change, and aims to reduce abuses of human rights.
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