Resume Aruna Roy born in 1946, went to a number of schools known for their innovative approach to education - including

the celebrated centre for the Arts, Kalakshetra in Chennai(Madras), Tamil Nadu. After obtaining a post graduate degree in English Literature from Delhi University, she taught for a year at Indraprastha College in Delhi, and then qualified to become a member of the Indian Administrative Service (I.A.S.) in 1968. She married her classmate in Delhi University, Sanjit (Bunker) Roy in 1970 who founded the well known Barefoot College (SWRC) in Tilonia, Rajasthan. She left the I.A.S. in 1975 to join the SWRC and rural development work in Rajasthan . She worked with the SWRC,(Barefoot College),Tilonia, Ajmer District, Rajasthan till 1983. Born in urban India, her real education about rural realities took place in these nine years. Working with the rural poor, she learnt about rural perceptions of inequality and the indifferent understanding of using democratic structures. She also understood their marginalization from democratic institutions and processes. Close interaction with a number of extraordinary people in the villages, convinced her that peoples political action was crucial for their own empowerment, both within and outside electoral politics. It became apparent that political action should be an organic process based on the strength and resources of the people themselves. She left the SWRCs development priorities in 1983 to try locating herself in the wide spectrum of peoples politics. In 1987 she joined Shankar Singh and Nikhil Dey to start working in central Rajasthan, to work towards evolving a peoples organization for empowerment and change. After two formative struggles for land and minimum wages, the poor of the area got together to establish the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) in 1990. The MKSS part of the non-party political process in India does not receive any institutional funding, Indian or foreign. The MKSS has worked to strengthen and evolve modes of participatory democracy. Especially to work towards building platforms of participation in democratic processes and institutions to meaningfully impact governance.

The National Campaign for Peoples Right to Information (NCPRI), was born out of these struggles. Since its inception in 1996, it became an important platform for advocacy for effective right to information legislation, at a state and national level. The draft of a central Right to Information legislation was prepared initially by the Press Council of India, along with the NCPRI, and strengthened and modified through broad based participation of lawyers, politicians, social activists, editors of newspapers, human rights activists, lawyers and exmembers of the judiciary. This draft became the basis of a ten year campaign for a strong national RTI law, passed eventually in 2005. The peoples struggle for the right to food and employment in Rajasthan, also led to the formation of broad based collective campaigns at the state and national levels- the Akal Sangharsh Samiti, the Right to Food Campaign and the Peoples Campaign for Employment Guarantee. Their strong people based advocacy helped ensure the passage of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) by the Indian Parliament in 2005. From 2004 2006, and from 2010 she has been a member of the National Advisory Council (NAC), set up by the UPA Government to evolve and monitor social. The first NAC laid the basis its political accountability with National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP) promising an Employment Guarantee Law, and a stronger Right to Information law to replace the weak and ineffective Freedom of Information Act 2002. She was also a member of the Central Employment Guarantee Council from 2006-2009.She has been the President of the National Federation for Indian Women (NFIW) since 2009. The Campaigns for the Right to Work, and the Right to Information, have demonstrated the potential of ordinary people to, exercise their powers in a democratic framework to influence, mould and determine national policy. The passing of the two legislations by the Lok Sabha ( Parliament) has strengthened processes of democratic struggle, and hope to ordinary citizens, empowering them to change their lives.

Aruna Roy has also been a member of different public hearings, tribunals and peoples commissions including the Concerned Citizens Tribunal, which investigated the organized violence and killing of innocent people in Gujarat in 2002. Aruna Roy was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership in 2000. The Magsaysay Award money has been put into an independent Trust ( Jan Hith Trust) to support the process of democratic struggle. She strongly believed that the Award actually belonged to the collective, and urged the Foundation to change its policy of only awarding individuals. This has resulted in the Award for Community leadership now being made eligible to collectives, and institutions. In 2010, she received the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for Excellence in Public Administration, Academia and Management by the President of India. She and the MKSS Collective have also recently been awarded the Rule of Law Award in the World Justice Forum held in Barcelona, Spain in June 2011, along with being listed as one of the 100 most influential people in the world by the TIME Magazine for 2011. Aruna Roy, is a member of the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS), , the National Campaign for Peoples Right to Information (NCPRI), the National Alliance of Peoples Movements (NAPM), the Peoples Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) and similar net works and campaigns.