Selected Published Work

Writing that asks
who the system forgets.

Policy commentary and rights advocacy by Vikas Gupta — IIM Ahmedabad alumnus writing on AI governance, economic opportunity, disability justice, and the institutions that shape young lives.

Featured OpenGlobalRights May 13, 2026

When Detention Becomes Punishment Before a Verdict

Structural inaccessibility in India's criminal justice system violates the rights of persons with disabilities — an argument that the design of detention itself becomes a pre-conviction sentence.

Disability Rights Criminal Justice India
Read on OpenGlobalRights
The Leaflet October 31, 2025

For India's Disabled Litigants, Justice is an Insurmountable Challenge

For millions of disabled Indians, justice is inaccessible not only in time but in understanding — physical, intellectual, and legislative barriers compound at every step of the legal process.

Disability Rights Access to Justice Law
Read on The Leaflet
Counterview

The AI Divide: How Technology is Leaving India's Public Schools Behind

While private schools integrate AI tools, India's public education system is being left behind — deepening a digital divide that compounds across every year of schooling.

AI Governance Education Inequality
Read on Counterview
Disabled World

How AI Efficiency is Turning Diversity into a Liability

AI-driven optimisation in hiring and promotion is quietly recasting diversity as an inefficiency — with disproportionate consequences for persons with disabilities and other marginalised groups.

AI & Disability Inclusion Labour
Read on Disabled World
Countercurrents

Two Identities, One Democracy: The Rise of the Voter Over the Citizen

Democratic identity in India is fracturing along a fault line: the periodic voter and the continuous citizen are no longer the same person — and institutions are being built around the former.

Democracy Institutions Citizenship
Read on Countercurrents
Counterview

Private Failures, Public Embarrassments: How Corporate Negligence Turned National Crisis

When private sector failures become public crises, the burden falls on citizens — an examination of how corporate negligence is repackaged as systemic inevitability.

Corporate Negligence Accountability Public Policy
Read on Counterview
Countercurrents March 16, 2026

The Mirror Doesn't Lie: How BJP Became the Congress It Swore to Bury

Weaponised agencies, institutional silence, and political imprisonment — the ruling party has not dismantled the Congress system. It has inherited it, polished it, and called it governance.

Democracy Institutions Governance
Read on Countercurrents
Countercurrents March 11, 2026

I Pay Taxes, Please Save My Life

On paying taxes, dying in silence, and the democracy you get when you mourn only your own. India is a hard country to be a taxpayer in — especially if you are in the upper brackets.

Taxation Democracy Public Policy
Read on Countercurrents
Counterview

The Cost of Being Indian: How Inequality and Market Logic Redefine Rights

When market logic colonises rights discourse, rights become priced goods — and the cost of being Indian is that the market almost always sides with those who can afford to pay.

Economic Inequality Rights Policy
Read on Counterview
Disabled World

India's Disability Rights Crisis: 27 Million Left Behind

A systemic examination of how 27 million disabled Indians are excluded from the rights and protections the law promises — and why the gap between policy and practice remains so wide.

Disability Rights India Policy
Read on Disabled World
Counterview

A Decade of Silence: How the Opposition Lost India's Human Rights Fight

Over ten years, India's opposition ceded the human rights agenda — allowing the terms of democratic contestation to be redrawn without a credible counter-narrative.

Democracy Human Rights Opposition Politics
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Counterview

Whither Accountability? A Death in Noida and The Price of Being Alive in India

On corporate negligence, public embarrassment, and the particular cost of being alive — and disposable — in a country where accountability is reserved for those who can afford to demand it.

Accountability Corporate Negligence Rights
Read on Counterview