Deepa Gupta

Dr. Deepa Gupta is a development professional and Doctoral Fellow at the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA), specializing in social behavior change, rural sanitation, livelihoods, and gender-responsive programming. With over 15 years of experience spanning grassroots implementation, program leadership, and academic research, she has worked extensively with national and international organizations, including BRAC International, World Bank-supported projects, and Plan International.

She most recently served as Deputy Director–Immersion and Learning Exchange (ILE) at Bandhan Konnagar, where she led strategic implementation of the Satat Jeevikoparjan Yojana (SJY) in partnership with JEEViKA, supporting over 10,000 ultra-poor households across 62 cluster-level federations. Her leadership focused on building Centres of Excellence, knowledge management, cross-learning, and scaling the Ultra-Poor Graduation Approach in the Global South.

Her doctoral research explores the intersections of social norms, networks, and communication for sanitation behavior in rural India, applying interdisciplinary tools from social marketing and public policy. She has published widely, presented at global conferences, and contributed to policy-relevant knowledge on WASH, cooperative models, and social protection. Dr. Gupta has also managed large-scale development programs, built strategic partnerships, and championed women's leadership and financial and social inclusion in rural economies.

· Biswas, S., De, I., Mudra, G., & Gupta, D. (2024). Toilet Adoption in Rural India: Social Norms and Behavioural Changes. Taylor & Francis.

· Gupta, D., & Nath, P. K. (2024). Why do cooperatives succeed? A comparative analysis of the global south and north. International Journal of Rural Management, 20(1_suppl), S105-S122.

• Nath. P, and Gupta. D.(2022), “GeM: A Fresh initiative to strengthen Indian Cooperatives, The Cooperator.60 (03), pp. 37-42.

· Gupta. D. and Biswas. S.N. (2020), “Implementation of Swacch Bharat Mission (SBM) in the Rural Areas”, Learning Rural Management- Cases and Caselets (Vol 1, pp. 3-16). ISBN 978-93-89431-09-4, New Delhi, India: Mahatma Gandhi National Council of Rural Education (MGNCRE), Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.

• Gupta. D. (2020), “Hegemonic Planning, People and Significance of Metis”, Manthan, an alumni initiative of the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRD&PR).
• (Under Review) Co-authored Paper titled Harmony Amidst Strife: A Systematic Review of Peacebuilding Initiatives from a Social Change Marketing Perspective, International Journal of Consumer Studies.
• (Accepted) Gupta. D. “Adoption of Toilets under SBM (G): A case study of rural India, Encyclopedia of Social marketing with Palgrave McMillan.

(Under review) Case Study “Efforts to reduce sex trafficking in Nigeria”, Encyclopaedia of Social Marketing, Palgrave McMillan.

• Participated in two days World Toilet Summit’18 at world toilet day, conducted by the World Toilet Organization, Singapore at Mumbai, India, in 2018.
• Participated in IGCS winter school 2019: Sustainable waste management conducted by Indo-German Centre for Sustainability at Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, in collaboration with RWTHAACHEN University, Germany, in the month of February-March’2019.
• Gupta. D., De. I. and Biswas, S. N. (2020), Normative Evaluation and Social Norms influencing the Sanitation Behavior in Rural India, Virtual Subsistence Marketplace Conference, Los Angeles, California: Loyola Marymount University, from 30th May to 1st June’2020.
• Gupta. D. (2021), Sanitation behavior in rural India, presented at “AIM-AMA Sheth Foundation Doctoral Consortium” conducted by Jagdish Sheth School of Management held from 25th to 30th June’21.
• Gupta. D, (2022), “Sanitation Behavior in Rural India” at International Conference Sustainable Business Practices in a VUCA World ICSBP2022 conducted by Rabat Business School, Morocco.
• Gupta. D, (2022), “Sanitation Behavior in Rural India: Role of Public and Community Institutions” at Third Virtual Subsistence Marketplaces Conference: The post-pandemic “New” Normal in Subsistence Marketplaces? Conducted by Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, California.
• Gupta. D, (2022), “Structural and Non-Structural Determinants influencing the Sanitation Behavior in Rural India” at World Social Marketing Conference’2022, Brighton, UK.
• Gupta. D and De. I (2022), “Sanitation Behavior in Rural India” at Third International Conference on Maintenance and Intelligent Asset Management”, ICMIAM 2022, Rural Assets for Sustainable Development
• Gupta. D. and Nath. P. (2022), “Why Only Some Cooperatives Succeed: A Comparative Analysis of Asia-Pacific Region and Beyond? At 24th Annual Convention of the Strategic Management Forum (SMF), 2022.

· Regional conference by the “Ministry of Women and Child Development”, GOI under the National Mission for the empowerment of Women on “Achieving Convergence for Empowerment of Women” in 2012.

· National Seminar sponsored by University Grants Commission and Conducted by Magadh University on “Household Food Insecurity and Hidden Hunger” in 2012.

· International Seminar sponsored by ICSSR and conducted by Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati on “Continuities and Discontinuities of Asian Engagement: Borders, Mobility and Identity in Northeast India and Asia”.

· National-level conference on developing the Gender Vulnerability Index by the Ministry of Women and Childin collaboration with Plan International (India Chapter) in 2017.

• Gupta. D., De. I. and Biswas, S. N. (2019), “Factors influencing the sanitation in Rural India” on Management Doctoral Colloquium and VGSOM Research Scholars’ Day (MDC & VRS 2019) at Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur.
• Gupta. D. (2019), “Social challenges on Solid Waste Management in rural and peri-urban Chennai” at Indo-German Centre for Sustainability at Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai.
• Gupta. D., De. I. and Biswas, S. N. (2019), Poster Presentation on “Determinants of demand of sanitation in rural India” at WIN Conference 2019, Innovate and Empower to Accelerate Social Change conducted by WIN Foundation at Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar.
• Gupta. D. (2019), “Seeing like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Conditions Have Failed” at TASS, a book review, at Institute of Rural Management Anand.
• Gupta. D. (2019), “Consumer Behavior and Social Norms: A study on Sanitation in India” in the doctoral colloquium at Institute of Rural Management Anand, Gujarat.
• Gupta. D. (2019), Poster Presentation titled “Social Norms, Behaviors, and Sanitation Marketing: Challenges and Opportunities” at 7th PAN IIM World Management Conference 2019 conducted by Indian Institute of Management, Rohtak, held from 12th to 14th December 2019.
• “WIN-KPCSD Roundtable Conference: Innovation to drive Social change” through WASH and Maternal and Child Health, organised jointly by WIN Foundation and the Kiran C Patel Centre for Sustainable Development- Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar.

· Management Development Programme on ‘Project and Financial Management’ conducted by Chandragupt Institute of Management, Patna-Bihar.

· ‘Training of Trainers on Participatory Training' conducted by Sahbhagi Sikshan Sansthan, Lucknow- Uttar Pradesh.

· Management Development Programme on ‘Human Resource and Organizational Development’ conducted by Chandragupt Institute of Management, Patna-Bihar.

· ‘Participatory Approaches for Irrigation Management’ conducted by National Institute of Rural Development, Hyderabad-Andhra Pradesh.

· Graduate Workshop sponsored by IKHR and conducted by Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati on “Environment and Development: New frontiers of Research on North-East India”.

· National Level Human Development Training Workshop Sponsored by UNDP-GoI and Conducted by the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati, in 2014.

· Introduction to Mechanism Design by Prof. Eric. S. Maskin at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.

· Participated in a western region workshop for developing a gender vulnerability index in Mumbai conducted by Plan International (India Chapter) in November’2017.

• Participated in seven days Faculty Development Program (FDP) conducted by the Institute of Rural Management Anand in May’2018.
• Participated in two days workshop on “Case Writing” conducted by the Case Research Society of India at the Institute of Rural Management Anand in October’2018.
• Participated in a technical workshop on “Shit flow Diagram” conducted by the Centre for Science and Environment, India, in collaboration with Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) in Mumbai in the month of November’2018.
• Attended a two days workshop on “Building Climate Resilience for Doubling Farmer’s Income” Innovations in Water Land, energy and Ecosystems conducted by International Water Management Institute at National Dairy Development Board, Anand, in December’2018.

· “Pedagogy of Waterscape for Sustainable Development”, an Interactive workshop on How to bring water into mainstream Education, conducted by the U.S.-India Educational Foundation (USIEF).

• Pre-Conference workshop conducted by Indian Institute of Management, Rohtak, at 7th PAN IIM World Management Conference 2019 held on 11th December’19.
• Participated in workshop on “Developing Teaching case with a focus on Responsible Management & UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)” conducted by New Delhi Institute of Management, scheduled on 14th and 29th June and 8th July’21.
• Participated in workshop on “Advance level of Data Analysis Using SPSS, AMOS & Process Macro” conducted by Blueforskining Research Academy, India, from 20th July’21 to 25th July’21.
• Participated in pre-conference workshop titled “Shining a light into the black box of Social Marketing planning, management and evaluation” at World Social Marketing Conference’2022, Brighton, UK.
• Conducted a workshop titled “Role of Women in Commons/Asset/Resource Management: Case of Water Management” and also presented a paper titled “Social Norms and Socio-Physical realities of WASH” at Third International Conference on Maintenance and Intelligent Asset Management”, ICMIAM 2022, Rural Assets for Sustainable Development.

2013-2014, Food and Nutrition Security: An Integrated Approach, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, Guwahati, Assam, India 

2015, Whit(h)er Farming? Saving Crops or Saving Lives, Institute of Rural Management Anand, Anand, Gujarat, India 2016, Case study of Implementation of Swachh Bharat Mission in villages of Bihar, Institute of Rural Management Anand, Anand, Gujarat, India 

2018-2019, Determinants of demand of sanitation in rural sanitation, Institute of Rural Management Anand, Anand, Gujarat, India 

2015-2023, Sanitation behavior in Rural India: Social Norms, Networks and Communication, Institute of Rural Management Anand, Anand, Gujarat, India

· Member of Editorial Board at Health Marketing Quarterly, Taylor & Francis.

· Invited to guide the post-Graduation participant of the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), Kolkata, for a dissertation titled “Evaluation of Sanitary Marketing Program in Rural India”.

· Invited as a member of evaluation panel for India Innovation Growth Programme 2.0, 2018, an initiative by Lockheed Martin, Department of Science & Technology and Tata Trusts conducted by Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE) at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and evaluated project proposals under the theme “Agriculture and Rural Livelihoods”.

· Member of Editorial Board of Magazine “Manthan”, at the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRD&PR), Hyderabad.

· Vice-President of Alumni Association of National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati raj, Hyderabad, from 2019 to present.

· Invited as guest speaker for training of ADEOs and CEOs on National Rural Livelihood Mission conducted by State Institute of Rural Development, Raipur, Chhattisgarh.

· Invited as the guest speaker for the virtual workshop on “Swacchata Action Plan 2020-2021” conducted by the Indian Institute of Tourism and Travel Management (IITTM), Gwalior, in collaboration with the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India.

· Invited to moderate the “Revisiting Development Strategies in the era of Global Pandemic” session at National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati raj, Hyderabad on 5th September’20.

• Member of Organizing Committee of 2nd and 3rd Edition of Doctoral Colloquium of Management and Development (DOCMAD) 2021and 2022 at Institute of Rural Management Anand, Gujarat
• Member of Organizing committee and managed and coordinated sessions on Rural Management Paradigm: Institutional or Transformational? Under the centenary of Dr Verghese Kurien as “Kurien Mahotsav” 2021, at the Institute of Rural Management Anand, Gujarat
• Member of Admission Panel for the selection of PRM 43 Batch at Institute of Rural Management Anand, Anand, Gujarat
• Invited to review research Proposals submitted at SBCC summit’22 to be held in December’22 in Morocco.
• Coordinated and Managed parallel track session at the 24th Annual Convention of the Strategic Management Forum (SMF), 2022, at IRMA.

· Subsistence marketplace, Norms, and Networks, Collective action

·  Social Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC), Buying and Consuming Behavior, Public Policy, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

· Education, Migration, Women centered interventions, Gender and WASH, Public Health, Women and child development

• Social Norms, Social Change I by University of Pennsylvania and UNICEF on Coursera.
• Social Norms, Social Change II by University of Pennsylvania and UNICEF on Coursera.

• Gender: Female
• Nationality: Indian

· Bakul Foundation (supporting initiatives for the orphanage)

· Andh Apang Jan Sanstha (supporting initiatives for the physically challenged children)

I, hereby, declare that the information mentioned above is correct to the best of my knowledge, and I bear the responsibility for the validity of the above-mentioned particulars., 06/05/25