RESEARCH PROFILE
- Current number of academic staff: 5 (with 15 affiliates in other departments).
- Recent publications:
- The Idea of India;
- Nehru’s Judgement;
- Social Movements,
- Political Parties and the Creation of New States in India;
- The Measure of a Tribe:
- The Cultural Politics of Constitutional Reclassification in North India;
- Towards Fusion: Atoms for Peace and Physics in India.
- Current research projects:
- Democracy in India;
- Jawaharlal Nehru;
- Legal understandings of culture in India;
- Subnational Political Regimes and Poverty: Small Farmers and the State;
- The sociology of science in 20th-century India.
- Partner organisations: The Institute is closely involved in the College’s key partnership with Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, with a programme of research exchanges for postgraduate students; it also receives visiting fellows from the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).
KEY FACTS
Student destinations
While many graduates may go on to a university-based academic career, others may pursue careers in both the public and private sector.
Head of group/division
Professor Sunil Khilnani, Director, King's India Institute
Duration
Expected to be MPhil two years FT, three years PT. PhD three years FT, four-six years PT. Normal start date September but students may commence at other times by arrangement.
Location
Strand Campus.
Year of entry 2013
Offered by
Arts and Sciences Cross-School Initiatives
India Institute
Closing date
No deadline for applications. Students interested in applying to funding should be aware that deadlines for this differ, therefore applicants should view the Graduate Funding Pages at
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/study/pg/funding/sources/index.aspx for more information.
No set number.
Fees
CONTACTS
Contact information
Postgraduate Officer, Centre for Arts & Sciences Admissions (CASA)
tel: +44 (0) 20 7848 2555
fax: +44 (0) 20 7848 7200
Email
Website
RESEARCH DESCRIPTION
The newly established King’s India Institute offers a unique and exciting environment for the in-depth study of India. The Institute is able to draw on academic expertise in a range of disciplines, and supervision may be provided from within the Institute or jointly with other faculty within the College. Staff research interests include:
Professor Sunil Khilnani:Intellectual history and political thought; the history and politics of modern India; democratic theory and non-Western experiences; strategic thought on India's place in the world.
Dr Kriti Kapila:The law in contemporary India; the politics of recognition and the category of 'tribe' in India; the historical DNA of population groups; the interface of national and transnational legal regimes.
Dr Jahnavi Phalkey:The history of science and technology; the roles of science in the transformation of independent India; the laboratory as a social institution; statistical practices; nuclear physics research and education in India; state power in independent India.
Dr Louise Tillin:Politics and development in contemporary India; the operation of India's federal system; the creation of India's newest states; agrarian political economy.
Staff interests associated with the research programme and its research groups
ACADEMIC ENTRY REQUIREMENTS
General entry advice
A Masters degree or, in exceptional circumstances only, a first class or good 2:1 honours degree or overseas equivalent.
APPLYING TO KING'S
To apply for graduate study at King's you will need to complete our graduate online application form. Applying online makes applying easier and quicker for you, and means we can receive your application faster and more securely.
King's does not normally accept paper copies of the graduate application form as applications must be made online. However, if you are unable to access the online graduate application form, please contact the relevant admissions/School Office at King's for advice.
APPLICATION PROCEDURE
Before applying, please read carefully the information about our research interests, and make sure that your research topic falls within one of these areas. You are welcome to contact a potential supervisor directly to discuss your research topic, and we also encourage you to contact the India Institute PhD admissions tutor with a draft research proposal before submitting a complete application through the online system. The admissions tutor will advise whether your research can, in principle, be carried out with us.
Admission will initially be for the MPhil but students are expected to transfer to the PhD proper by the end of the first year, and no later than the end of the second year, on the recommendation of the Institute’s graduate upgrading panel.
September, January, and April start dates available. Applicants are strongly encouraged to start their degree at beginning of the academic year in September, when the College offers a full induction programme.
PERSONAL STATEMENT & SUPPORTING INFORMATION
In addition to a 3-5 page research proposal, applicants should submit a personal statement outlining their reasons for pursuing further research.
FUNDING
Graduate School and Global Institute studentships and bursaries; self-funded. Applicants should consult our postgraduate funding database at
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/graduate/funding/database for information on funding opportunities from other organisations.
Staff profiles
Contemporary India Research MPhil/PhD, option of joint PhD with NUSIndia, it has been said, is the most interesting place in the world: a country of continental scale, immense civilizational depth, unparalleled diversity represented through democratic politics, economically now on the move and in the midst of multiple transformations. The central dilemmas of modern politics, economic development, and social change are all dramatized across the Indian landscape – while India's growing international profile poses profound questions for the global system. The King's India Institute has been established to deepen academic and practical understanding of modern India's rise - and its global implications.
The Institute's first taught degree, the MA Modern India, is a unique postgraduate course designed at once to engage students with this complex, fascinating and pivotal country, and to use the study of contemporary India as an intellectual laboratory through which to focus global theoretical and policy questions. Thus, India's specificities – whether concerning for instance, the country's democratic politics, its environmental predicaments and entrepreneurial forms, its security issues and dilemmas of secularism, its urban and public health problems, its varieties of cultural production and consumption, its economic growth and diverse social change, the role of its media, and consequences of its science and technology policy choices – will be explored in relationship to more general theoretical, political and policy perspectives.
The MA degree's intellectual foundation rests on two core courses that I will be involved in teaching. One examines India's economy, polity and society since 1947; the other surveys thematic and conceptual perspectives on modern India (encompassing for instance, nationalism, democracy, the state, law).Additionally, students have the option to pursue various specializations: politics; security and strategic studies; history, society & culture; history and policy of science and technology; media and journalism; and urban studies. Across these strands, our approach at the Institute is to study India in cross-disciplinary and problem-focused ways. The MA will thus equip our graduates to pursue diverse careers relating to India - whether in the academy, government, business, media and civil society.
The India Institute has strong links with India's universities and research institutions, government, private sector, media and civil society, and students are encouraged to take advantage of opportunities these offer. In addition, the India Institute is richly immersed in the intellectual and cultural life of the great city in which it stands – London, a city that is historically and still today the cultural nexus of the West and India.