R. Parasuram is a Senior Fellow with the Food, Land and Water team at WRI India.

Parasuram retired from the IAS in 2013, as Chief Secretary, Government of Madhya Pradesh. After that for over five years he served as the State Election Commissioner. Following this, for a year-and-half he was Director General of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Good Governance and Policy Analysis (AIGGPA), Bhopal. It is an autonomous institute set up by the Government of M.P. to serve as a consultancy and public policy formulation agency.

He is an electrical engineering graduate and has spent a year at IDRC, Ottawa, Canada, as a Fellow in the public policy area.

While living in small towns across Madhya Pradesh during his formative years he developed an abiding interest in issues and challenges faced by the rural population in developing countries like India. He is of the view that eliminating rural poverty continues to be a major challenge. He believes in the capacity and willingness of India’s rural population to overcome the adversarial economic circumstances in which large numbers continue to live. This can be achieved through sustainable livelihood opportunities, in agriculture and through non-farm employment. Improved physical connectivity, access to digital technologies and strong grassroots level institutions can help achieve this. Over the years, as the realization and sensitivity around concerns relating to the environment, biodiversity and climate change have grown, he has also become appreciative of the inextricable link between rural livelihoods and the sustainable management of natural resources.

While in government service, he served for long years in the rural development and agriculture sectors, both in policy and implementation positions. He considers himself fortunate to have worked in a variety of jobs in these sectors. In real work situations he could pursue his areas of interest; initially, while serving as the Collector, in the 1980s, in three predominantly rural districts of Madhya Pradesh: Sidhi, Satna and Bastar, and later on in the Departments of Agriculture, Panchayat & Rural Development, and Technical Education & Skilling, and as the country rep in Rome at the FAO, IFAD and WFP. Most recently at the AIGGPA, apart from coordinating the Institute’s work across sectors, including for instance NRM, rural and urban livelihoods, capacity building and organizational strengthening, and public health, he was instrumental in the setting up of a new Centre for Urban Governance.