Meet the Team
Vivek Gupta
Vivek is the guide that inspired us to start thinking about how celebrating Utsavas is different than making up reasons to cook yummy food! In between Vivekji’s schedule of teaching classes daily, travelling to speak in different cities, and caring for his two young kids, he still found the time to help write and later, search for the tiniest, yet most important edits that could have turned our festivals into ‘feast’ivals!
Sheela Gupta
Sheela is a self-employed immigration lawyer and mother to two energetic, minecraft loving boys which has given her the flexibility to take the wheel on writing this book! Without Sheela’s gift of breaking down our festivals into simple, yet meaningful stories and practices, we would have still been stuck in unpacking Sanskrit mantras or overwhelmed with elaborate poojas instead of being able to apply them in our everyday lives.
Nina Bhattacharaya
Nina is a queer therapist, educator, dancer, activist and much more! Nina brings a little magic to everyone she interacts with because of her ability to authentically connect with the people around her. Nina was one of the early visionaries for Traditions 5 years ago and without her prodding (and not to mention impressive editing and design skills) there would be no book!
Ragini Ramesh
Ragini wears many important hats in her home and in the community, but most notable is how much time she sacrifices to serve and connect with people to make them feel happy. Ragini devoted endless hours to designing, editing and illustrating Traditions. She probably should have been paid for her work, but Ragini is the type of person who would say something like “the opportunity to work on this was payment in and of itself!”
Vinay Malikaarjun
Vinay is a professional educator and educational researcher, having recently earned his Doctorate of Education degree from the University of Pennsylvania. In his spare time, he enchants people with his brilliance as a professional Carnatic vocalist and percussionist. Vinay deeply enjoys proofreading and editing, and without his fine eye to detail there would be far too many misplaced commas, because, who really knows how to use commas effectively?
Sapna Rao
Vinay is a professional educator and educational researcher, having recently earned his Doctorate of Education degree from the University of Pennsylvania. In his spare time, he enchants people with his brilliance as a professional Carnatic vocalist and percussionist. Vinay deeply enjoys proofreading and editing, and without his fine eye to detail there would be far too many misplaced commas, because, who really knows how to use commas effectively?