Rupanjali Karthik is a professional civil servant from India and a serving member of the Indian Administrative Service. She has worked at key leadership positions in the state government in India for more than 10 years.

In 2017–18, as a Joint Japan World Bank Graduate Scholar, she received her Master’s degree in International Development Policy (MIDP) from the Sanford School of Public Policy. Pursuing advanced learning in law, she earned her Master of Laws (LLM) from the Duke Law School (2018–19) and subsequently joined the Doctor of Juridical Science (SJD) program in 2019.

As a policymaker with an educational background in law and policy, she is interested in learning about “adaptive regulation,” that lies at the intersection of law and policy and is one of the promising ways of dealing with dynamic regulatory scenarios. The concept and practice of adaptive regulation is quite evolved in the U.S and Europe, however, there is limited scholarship on its prevalence and practice in India. Accordingly, her doctoral research centers on understanding adaptive regulations in India and analyzing the federal laws and policies in three sectors: Groundwater resources, Renewable energy, and Artificial Intelligence. Her research objectives are two-fold; to gauge the adaptability of the laws and policies of India in the given sectors, and to recommend ways of improving the adaptability of laws and policies that are best suitable to the Indian context. As a final outcome of her doctoral research, she intends to develop a guidance document for the law and policymakers on effectively designing adaptive regulations.