Migration

Middle Classes in Indian Cities

Populist Politics

Platform Economy and Gig Work

Urban Community, Vulnerability and Community Organisation

Social Policy, Welfare and Development

City and Society

Social Justice 

Book:

Beyond Consumption: India's New Middle Class in The Neo-Liberal Times. London and New York: Routledge. 2022. See Here

Data Centres As Infrastructure: Frontiers of Digital Governance in Contemporary India. Hyderabad: Orient BlackSwan. 2022. See Here

Traversing Bihar: Politics of Social Justice and Development. New Delhi: Orient BlackSwan. 2014. See Here

Human Rights: Agencies and Agenda, Saloni Publications, New Delhi, 2003.

Articles: 

• Sohini Sengupta and Manish K. Jha (2026). Migrant Worker Tragedies: Risk Transfer and Reactive Social Protection in Kruks-Wisner, G., & Roychowdhury, P. (Eds.). Unequal contagion: Citizenship, democracy, and the politics of COVID-19 in India. Oxford University Press. See Here
• Pankaj, A.K., Jha, M.K. Social (in)security and social policy for gig workers in South Asia. Discov glob soc 4, 205 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1007/s44282-026-00579-0 Read Here 
• Jha, Manish K. (2026). Pandemic precarity, state capacity, and governance fault lines: interrogating the paradoxical case of Maharashtra.In Gisselquist, R.M., Kundu, A., Sen, K. (Eds.) The subnational state and crisis response: Understanding pandemic governance across India. Routledge. See Here
• Caglar, A., Novak, P., Dona, G., Jha, M.K. and Ćuković, A. (2026), Introduction: Entangled and Uneven Landscapes of Digitised Migration. Int Migr, 64: e70168. https://doi.org/10.1111/imig.70168 Read Here
• Jha, M.K., Vyas, M. (2026). Liminal Lives: Migrants, Refugees, and the Contested Terrain of Social Protection. In: Chowdhory, N., Singh, P. (eds) New Frontiers in the Register of Migration and Refugee Studies. International Perspectives on Migration(). Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-95-4465-3_5
• Manish K Jha & Sohini Sengupta. (2026). Power, Prejudice and Opportunism: Tracing Vigilante Crimes and Social Harm in India, The British Journal of Criminology, 2026. Read Here
• Manish K. Jha & Mouleshri Vyas. (2026). Mumbai’s Southern Question and the Political Economy of Work and Space, in Ranabir Samaddar, Enrica Morlicchio and Sandro Mezzadra (Eds.)The City as the Southern Question: Alternative Histories of Urbanisation After Gramsci. Routledge.
• Manish K. Jha. (2025). Ethics and Social Welfare, 1–5.https://doi.org/10.1080/17496535.2025.2570935. Read here
• Manish K. Jha, Robert J. Chaskin & Mouleshri Vyas (2025): Slum resettlement, built environment, and socio-spatial dynamics: Lived experiences in Mumbai’s resettlement colonies, Journal of Urban Affairs. DOI: 10.1080/07352166.2025.2536857 Read Here
• Jha, M.K. & Chakrabarty, A. (2025). The production of a ‘digital citizen’: citizen-migrant conundrum through the National Register of Citizens in India. International Migration, 63, e70023. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/imig.70023
• Jha, Manish K., Sylvia Garcia Delahaye, Shubha Srishti, and Caroline Dubath. (2025). Social Housing and Right to the City: Experiences of Inhabitants and Social Workers in Mumbai and Geneva. Journal of Asian and African Studies. Read Here
• Book review: Ashok Pankaj, Lohia ke Sapno ka Bharat: Bhartiya Samajwad ki Ruprekha [India of Lohia’s Dreams: Contours of Indian Socialism]. Social Change. Pp 1- 4 https://doi.org/10.1177/00490857241288411 
• Chaskin, R.J., Vyas, M. and Jha, M.K. (2024), Formalization, Citizenship and the Challenges of Self-Governance in Mumbai's Slum Relocation Colonies. International Journal OF Urban and Regional Research (IJURR), 48: 1115-1136. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2427.13274. Read Here.
• Pankaj, Ajeet & Jha, Manish & Farhad, Saima & Wani, Ibrahim. (2024). ‘Document’ and North-Indian Labour Migrants: Governing Labour Mobility in Manipur. Journal of Asian and African Studies. 10.1177/00219096241300449. Read Here
• Pandemic-induced Migration From Campus to Digital Mode: Experiences From Social Work Students and Teachers in India and Sweden (Jan Magnusson and Manish K Jha). 2024. https://doi.org/10.1177/25166026241266672 Read Here
• Knockout Power: Heatwaves this Summer. Economic and Political Weekly. Vol 59, Issue 26-27. Jun 2024. (Sohini Sengupta and Manish K Jha). Read Here
• प्रवासियों के लिए “पलायन” एक विकल्प: पलायन की प्रक्रिया में विरोधाभास और प्रक्षेपपथ". अजीत कुमार पंकज, मनीष के. झा और इफ्तेखार आलम. सामाजिक विमर्श. 6(2) 223–237, 2023. Sage Journal. 10.1177/25816543241263213
• Rethinking Transnational Social Work Pedagogy for Climate Change, Migration, and Crisis Preparedness.(Janet Carter Anand, Anish K. R., Manish K. Jha, Bipin Jojo, Satu Ranta-Tyrkkö) in Catherine Forde, Satu Ranta-Tyrkkö, Pieter Lievens, Komalsingh Rambaree, Helena Belchior-Rocha (Eds.)Teaching and Learning in Ecosocial Work. Springer Nature Switzerland. 2024. See Here 
• Gig workers in precarious life: The trajectory of exploitation, insecurity, and resistance. The American Journal of Economics and Sociology. 2024.https://doi.org/10.1111/ajes.12563 (Ajeet Kumar Pankaj & Manish K Jha).
• महामारी मैं सड़कों पर चलते श्रमिकों की साथ चल रही है उनकी असुरक्षा और उनका डर। अनामिका प्रियदर्शी और गोपाल कृष्णा (सम्पादित) महामारी की सरहदें। आकार बुक्स। नई दिल्ली। (मनीष के झा और अजीत कुमार पंकज)। २०२३  
• Insecurity and Fear Travel as Labour Travels in the Time of Pandemic in Ritajyoti Bandopadhyay, Paula Banerjee and Ranabir Samaddar (Eds.) India's Migrant Workers and the Pandemic. Social Science Press: New Delhi (South Asia Edition). 2023.
• Migrant Workers Paid a Huge Price for COVID-19. https://newshub.360info.org/register  
• Nationalism and populist politics: the migrant-citizen conundrum in Assam. Citizenship Studies. 2023. (With Anindita Chakrabarty). https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13621025.2023.2178637 
• The Making of New Dalit Middle Class: Struggle, Aspirations and Changing Lifestyle in Navi Mumbai, India. Journal of African and Asian Studies.  (Ajeet Kumar Pankaj and Manish K Jha). 2023. https://journals.sagepub.com/eprint/XZ7RZGRE7BPPDBJDGAY7/full 
• राजनीतिक व्यवहार के रूप में लोकलुभावनवाद: हिंदी प्रदेश में जाति और सामाजिक न्याय। बद्री नारायण (सम्पादित) सामाजिकी । राजकमल प्रकाशन। अंक -३, अप्रिल-जून २०२२।  
• LES ROHINGYAS, UNE COMMUNAUTE 'APATRIDE' TERRITOIRES, CONTEXTES POLITIQUE ET DEVELOPMENT COMMUNAUTAIRE. IN Armbruster Elatifi, U., Darbellay, K., Fumeaux-Evéquoz, N., Garcia Delahaye, S., Lambelet, A. & Tironi, Y. (2022). Enjeux des territoires pour l'animation socioculturelle. Actes du IXe colloque du Réseau international de l'animation. Éditions HETSL. (ISBN 978-2-88284-080-6). https://www.hetsl.ch/laress/publications/detail/enjeux-des-territoires-pour-lanimation-socioculturelle/show/Publication/    

• Production of Knowledge and Methodologies in Conflict Induced Displacement and Forced Migration in Nasreen Chowdhory and Paula Banerjee (Eds.) Gender, Migration and Identity in India. 2022. Pp 17-42. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan. (With Shagun Saklani Pande). See Here
• Jha). Read Here
• Pandemic Precarity And The Complicated Case Of Maharashtra: Interrogating State Capacity And Its Fault Lines, WIDER Working Paper 2022/46 Helsinki: UNU-WIDER, 2022. https://www.wider.unu.edu/publication/pandemic-precarity-and-complicated-case-maharashtra  
• Mourning Interrupted: Death and Grief during COVID-19 in MIGRANTS ON THE MOVE: Precarity in Times of the Pandemic in Pushpendra, Shashank Chaturvedi, Amit Ranjan. New Delhi: Aakar Books. 2022. See Here
• Weather Woes: Climate Communication and Social Protection in the Indian Heat Wave. Economic and Political Weekly. Vol 57, No 23, June 2022. Read Here
• Migrants, Refugees, and the Contested Question of Social Protection. Policies and Practices No 125.November 2021. Pp 1-15. (with Mouleshri Vyas). Read Here
• Neoliberal Governmentality and Social Policymaking in India: Implications for In/Formal Workers and Community Work. The International Journal of Community and Social Development. 2021;3(3):198-214. (with Ajjet Kumar Pankaj) Read Here
• Risks and resilience: COVID-19 response and disaster management policies in India. 2021. India Review. Routledge. Vol 20, No 2, Pp 121-142. (with Sohini Sengupta). Read Here  
• Pandemics, Public Health, and Sanitation Workers in Mumbai: Crisis of Work and Life'. Refugee Watch. 2021. Vol 57. Pp 14-33. (with Mouleshri Vyas). Read Here
• Social construction of migrant identities: everyday life of Bangladeshi migrants in West Bengal. Community Development Journal. 2021. (with Anindita Chakrabarty) Read Here).
• Controlling Journeys, Controlling labour: COVID 19 and Migrants, in Asha Hans, Kalpana Kannabiran, Manoranjan Mohanty and Pushpendra (eds.) Migration, Workers, And Fundamental Freedoms: Pandemic Vulnerabilities and States of Exception in India. New York: Routledge. 2021. (with Pushpendra). Read Here 
• Social Policy and State–Community Relationships: Storm over Forest Rights in India. The British Journal of Social Work, Volume 50, Issue 8, December 2020. (with Sohini Sengupta). Read Here
• ‘Stateless’ Rohingyas: persecution, displacement and complex community development, Community Development Journal. Read Here
• Social Policy, COVID-19 and Impoverished Migrants: Challenges and Prospects in Locked Down India, The International Journal of Community and Social Development, Vol 2, No 2, PP 152-172. 2020. (With Sohini Sengupta). Read Here
• Exploring the 'lived' Middle Class: Everyday experiences, anxieties and adjustments, in Christian Suter, S. Madheswaran and B.P. Mani (eds.) The Middle Class in Wold Society: Negotiations, Diversities and Lived Experiences. Routledge: New Delhi. 2020. (with Ibrahim Wani). Read Here
• India and U.S can no longer afford to look away from systemic injustice. The Wire. 15 June 2020.   (with Sneha Tatapudy). Read Here
• The Upward Slope of Pandemic Politics. The Newsclick, 27 April 2020. (with Ibrahim Wani). Read Here 
• Will Migrant Workers and Their Grievances Always Be Invisible to the Public Eye? in The Wire, 17 April 2020. (with Ibrahim Wani). Read Here 
• Insecurity and Fear Travel as Labour Travels in the Time of Pandemic in Ranabir Samaddar (Ed.)  Borders of an Epidemic: COVID-19 and Migrant Workers. Kolkata: Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group, 2020 (with Ajeet Kumar Pankaj). Read Here
• Social Work and the Community Question: Addressing Complexities of Social Structures in Gurnam Singh and Shepard Masocha (eds.) Anti-Racist Social Work: International Perspective. Macmillan International: London. 2020. (with P.K. Shajahan). Read Here
• Populism and Deployment of Social Justice: Caste as a Coordinate in the Politics Bihar and U.P, Policies and Practices, in Populism: Politics,  Policies and Social Justice, Policies and Practices. Kolkata: CRG, 2019. Read here
• Bihar in the Sixties and Seventies: The Enigmatic Figure of Karpoori Thakur. In Ranabir Samaddar (Ed.), From Popular Movements to Rebellion: The Naxalite Decade, New York: Routledge, 2019. Read Here
• An Income Redistribution Plan will not end poverty, Hindustan Times (Op-Ed). February 12, 2019 (Co-authored). Read Here
• Migration: Contemporary Issues and Concerns, The Indian Journal of Social Work (Special Editorial), 80 (1), 5-8, 2019. Read Here
• On the Political Fringes. The Hindu (Op-Ed), May 8, 2019.  (Co-authored). Read Here
• Homeless Migrants in Mumbai: Life and Labour in Urban Space in Ranabir Samaddar (eds.) Migrants and The Neoliberal City. Hyderabad: Orient Black Swan. 2018. Pp 123-146. See Here
• Review of Annihilation of Caste (The Annotated Critical Edition)by B.R. Ambedkar, Community Development Journal, 54 (1), 158-163, 2019. Read Here
• From Kosi to Delhi: Life and Labour of the Migrants in Ranabir Samaddar (eds.) Migrants and The Neoliberal City. Hyderabad: Orient Black Swan. 2018. Pp307-330. See Here
• 'Migrant Crisis': Crisis, Othering and Border Walls in Mainstream Western Media Discourse". Refugee Watch, 49, June 2017. Pp 42-61. Read Here
• Homeless Migrants in Mumbai: Life and Labour in Urban Space. Economic and Political Weekly. Vol LI, Nos 26 &27. June 25-July 2.Pp 67-77. 2016. Read Here
• Community organising and political agency: changing community development subjects in India in Rosie R. Meade, Mae Shaw and Sarah Banks (eds.) Politics, power and community development. Bristol: Policy Press. Pp 65-82. 2016. See Here
• Community Development Practice in India: Interrogating Caste and Common Sense in Mae Shaw and Marjorie Mayo (eds.) Class, Inequality and Community Development. Bristol: Policy Press. Pp 93-106. 2016. See Here
• Liquid Disaster and Frigid Response: Disaster and Social Exclusion. International Social Work Vol. 58(5) 704–716. 2015. Read Here
• Governing Caste and Managing Conflicts: Bihar, 1990-2011, in Ranabir Samaddar (ed.) “Government of Peace: Social Government, Security and the Problematic of Peace”, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing. 2015. See Here
• Biopolitics and Urban Governmentality in Mumbai in Sandro Mezzadra and Ranabir Samaddar (eds.) The Biopolitics of Development. Springer India. 2013. See Here
• The Idea of Identity Cards(s) and Experiences of Subaltern Mumbai in Atig Ghosh (Ed.) Branding the Migrant. Frontpage Publications. Kolkata. 2013. See Here
• Disasters: Experiences of Development during the Embankment Years in Bihar in Ranabir Samaddar and Suhit Sen (eds.) New Subjects and New Governance in India. New Delhi: Routledge. 2012. See Here
• State, Space and Political Subjects: A Case of Special Economic Zones. Indian Journal of Social Work. Vol 73. Issue 2. April 2012. Pp 157-176. See Here
• Place of Poor in Urban Space. Policies and Practices. Vol 39. No. 1. Kolkata: 2011. Read Here
• ‘Human Security Crises in India: From Fiery Field of a Conflict Zone’ in Malcolm McIntosh and Alan Hunter (ed.) Perspectives on Human Security. Greenleaf Publishing. Sheffield. 2010. See Here
• Gulamia Ab Hum Nahi Bajaibo: People’s Expressions for Justice in Jehanabad in Paula Bannerjee and Sajay Chaturvedi (ed.) Marginalities and Justice, Sage Publications. 2009.
• Food Security in Perspective: Significance of Social Action. Community Development Journal. Vol 44, No. 3 Oxford University Press. Pp 351-366. June 2009. Read Here
• ‘Rights Based Approach and Social Work Academia: Challenges and Responsibilities vis-a-vis Child Rights’ in Seema Sharma and Manoj K Jha (ed.) In Opposition to Silence. Alternotes Press. New Delhi. 2009. See Here
• Food Needs Food for Thought: Starving Children under Globalisation in K. Satyarthi and B. Zutshi (Eds.), Globalisation, Development and Child Rights, New Delhi: Shipra Publications, 2006, 71-78. See Here
• Hunger and Starvation Deaths: Call for Public Action,    Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. XXXVII No.52. December 28, 2002- January 3, 2003. Mumbai. Read Here
• Exclusion of Dalits: A Review from Human Rights Perspective,  Contemporary Social Work (Journal), Department of Social Work, Lucknow University, Lucknow Vol. XIX, April 2002. 

Podcast

 Environmental Justice and Community Approach in Social Work See Here

Video

Migrant Mumbai Voices, SMCSChannel TISS- See Here

Social Work Education for a Global World: Innovating for Transformative Change (SoWEGloW) Norway University of Applied Sciences (HVL), Funded by Norwegian Directorate for Higher Education and Skills. (In collaboration with Dr Hege Aarlie, HVL, Norway)

Right to the city in contemporary urban transformations: the voice of the inhabitants of Mumbai and Geneva. Knowledge2ACTION, Swissnex, Switzerland. (In collaboration with Dr Sylvia Garcia Delahaye (HETS Geneva, HES SO), Switzerland

Digital Labour Platforms and Future of Work: A Study of Gig Workers Insecurity and Precarity.Jay Prakash Narayan National Centre of Excellence in the Humanities, IIT Indore (Ajeet Kumar Pankaj, IISER Bhopal and Manish K Jha)

Sharing Best Practices in Crisis Preparedness in Social Work (TFK Social work). Finnish National Agency for Education. https://converis.jyu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Project/101411225?lang=en_GB 

Addressing the Challenges of Civil Society Organizational Action in Post-COVID Urban India", University of Chicago India Centre.

The making of inclusive and/or exclusive cities through the lens of social work and its participatory tools and approaches: What right to the City for the inhabitants and the communities of new neighbourhoods in Switzerland and India?". Research Partnership Grant (call 2021). Zurich University of Applied Sciences. Leading House South Asia & Iran. ZHAW.

Lund University's Action Plan For Cooperation With Asia 2019 – 2021" (SAMV 2016/504).
https://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/sites/www.lunduniversity.lu.se/files/2021-05/action-plan-for-lund-universitys-cooperation-with-asia-2019-2021.pdfExperience.

Aspiration and Struggles: A Study of New Middle Classes in India (Sponsored by Indian Council of Social Science Research)

Department Research Support under the Special Assistance Programme (Sponsored by University Grants Commission)

Good Practices in Overcoming Deprivation in India and UK, the thematic collaboration between TISS and University of East London (UKIERI- UK India Education and Research Initiative, Sponsored by British Council)

Cities, Rural Migrants and the Urban Poor – Issues of Violence and Social Justice, Calcutta Research Group (Supported by Ford Foundation)

E-Content Project, Social Work, University Grants Commission and Ministry of Human Resources Development, Government of India

International Development Project Award from the Animals & Society Institute (ASI) and The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS)

Erasumus + award with University of Eastern Finland, Kuopio, Finland.

City and Data Centre, a collaborative project with WEstern Sydney University and MCRG, Kolkata.

Populism and political Practices, RLS & CRG.

Migrant Workers and Urbanization in Politically Sensitive Areas: A Study of Kashmir & Manipur, sponsored under IMPRESS-ICSSR

• Social Policy, Planning and Programme (Postgraduate- TISS)
• Social action, Advocacy and Movements ((Postgraduate- TISS)
• Mobilization and Advocacy for Rights of Children and Families (Postgraduate-TISS)
• Idea of India and Democracy