Prof. Santwana completed her B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) from National Law University Odisha (NLUO), Cuttack. She was awarded the CEU Master’s Tuition Award to pursue an LL.M. in Human Rights Law from Central European University (CEU), Budapest. Her areas of teaching and research interest are human rights and criminal justice. Specifically, she focuses on issues of gender violence and the relationship between law and gender equality.
During her LL.M., she was awarded a competitive grant by the Central European University Foundation of Budapest, to participate in the ‘Courts in Dialogue’ course conducted by Prof. András Sajó at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France. She wrote her LL.M. thesis on ‘India’s conformity with international human rights standards to combat rape’ for which she was awarded a Distinction.
She also has practical experience working with human rights organizations such as the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, Budapest, where she assisted in research and drafting of a case relating to child rights violations. She has previously worked in the Women Safety Division of Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), Government of India, New Delhi, where she provided legal research and opinion on the Ministry advisories, international and bilateral treaties and court cases in matters relating to prison reforms, anti-trafficking and crimes against women and children.
In 2015-16, she worked as a Legislative Assistant to Member of Parliament (LAMP) Fellow (Fellowship offered by PRS Legislative Research), where she extensively researched on matters of public policy, drafted private member bills (for welfare of sex workers and senior citizens) and assisted the concerned Member of Parliament in parliamentary interventions relating to human rights violations in her constituency. She is also qualified to practice as an Advocate in India and has practiced in the Supreme Court of India for a year.
Prior to joining JGU, she worked as an Assistant Professor at KIIT School of Law, Bhubaneswar, where she taught courses such as Law of Crimes, International Human Rights Law and Human Rights Practice. She has also successfully qualified the UGC National Eligibility Test (NET) in Law.
Her other interests include travelling and reading fiction.