Nithya Kothenmaril is a doctoral candidate at the School of Law and Government, Dublin City University. She has a Master of Philosophy degree in Social Work from Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai (India). She holds a Master’s degree in Social work from Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam (India), and Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics from Calicut University, Kerala (India).

She worked as a research officer with the Tata Institute of Social sciences, India before her M.Phil degree. Her research interests are Caste, Gender, and political participation in South India. Currently, she has a Post-Graduate Research Scholarship within the School of Law and Government funded by the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Dublin City University. Her research thesis in DCU focuses on the experiences of the Elected Dalit women representatives in the Local Self Government Institutions in Kerala, India. Her thesis is being co-supervised by Dr. Valesca Lima and Dr. Jivanta Schottli from the School of Law and Government.