Nitasha Kaul

• Name — Nitasha Kaul • Birth Name — Nitasha Kaul • Born — November 1976 • Birthplace — Gorakhpur, India • Citizenship — British • Known for — Residue • Education — St. Thomas' School • Alma Mater — University of Delhi University of Hull • Occupation — Writer, Poet, Activist, Academic

Nitasha Kaul was born in November 1976 in Gorakhpur, in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, into a Kashmiri Pandit family that had migrated from the Downtown Mohalla of Srinagar, in the Kashmir Valley of Jammu and Kashmir. Kaul was raised in New Delhi and studied at St. Thomas' School. Kaul graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Economics from the Shri Ram College of Commerce of the University of Delhi. Kaul moved from India to England in 1997, at the age of 21, for pursuing her post-graduate degree at the University of Hull. Kaul went on to earn her Doctorate in Economics and Philosophy from Hull in 2003. Her doctoral thesis was Interrogating the Subject-World of Economic Epistemology: Re-Imagining Theory and Difference.

Kaul is a professor of Politics, International Relations, and Critical Interdisciplinary Studies at the University of Westminster in the UK. In addition to her chair, she is also the Director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD). Kaul served as a lecturer of economics at University of Bath and as an assistant professor of economics at the Bristol Business School from 2002 to 2007 before being made associate professor in Creative Writing at the Royal Thimphu College in Bhutan (2010). Professor in Politics and International Relations at the University of Westminster. She has published widely on themes relating to democracy, political economy, Hindutva/Indian politics, misogyny, technology/Artificial Intelligence, identity, rise of right-wing nationalism, feminist and postcolonial critiques, small states in geopolitics, regions of Bhutan, Kerala, and Kashmir. Having received multiple research grants and awards for her research, writing, and activism, she is the author of over 150 publications, including 7 single-authored or edited scholarly and literary books, book chapters in numerous critical and ground-breaking edited collections, plus peer-reviewed original research articles in numerous journals across humanities and social science disciplines. On 22 October 2019, Kaul served as one of the key witnesses at a United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing about the human rights situation in Jammu and Kashmir, following the revocation of special status within India. Kaul outlined extensive UNHCHR reports about the violations of human rights (and democratic principles) in both Indian and Pakistan-administered Kashmir along with the clampdown on communication facilities and mass-detention in the Indian territory at the time.

In February 2024, Kaul was invited to participate as a speaker in a two-day convention, but she was denied entry to India at Kempegowda International Airport, in Bengaluru, Karnataka, even though she carried a valid Overseas Citizen of India credentials. While there has been no official statement from the Government of India on why she was denied entry, speculation is that it was a result of her criticism of Indian Government Policies in Kashmir, including her use of the term "occupied" for the state in her coursework. Kaul's OCI card was canceled in the same incident.

Nitasha Kaul is recorded as economist, writer, sociologist and poet.