Dr. Ramanath Jha is Distinguished Fellow at Observer Research Foundation, Mumbai. He works on urbanisation — urban sustainability, urban governance and urban planning.
Dr. Jha belongs to the 1977 batch of the Indian Administrative Service. In the 80s and 90s, he worked as Administrator, Pandharpur Municipal Council; Administrator Solapur, Collector and Deputy Director Municipal Administration, Ahmednagar; Municipal Commissioner, Pune; and Metropolitan Commissioner, MMRDA. His subsequent postings were as Regional Advisor, South Asia for the Urban Management Programme of the UNDP/UN-Habitat; Vice Chairman and Managing Director at MSRDC; and Principal Secretary, Transport, Ports and State Excise, Government of Maharashtra.
He received the state government’s Chinmulgund Award for Administrative Excellence in 1989. He sought voluntary retirement from government in 2008 and joined the private sector as CEO & MD, Khed Economic Infrastructure Pvt Ltd. In 2015, Dr. Jha led the Mumbai DP team for preparing the Development Plan Mumbai 2034 (2015-2019).
Dr. Jha has co-authored the books — Towards People Friendly Cities — published by UNICEF; Urban Essays, published by YASHADA and co-edited Perspectives in Urban Development, published by Capital Publishing Company. He has published a number of papers on a variety of urban subjects and has widely lectured on urban issues.
