Nidhi Sudhan is an adventurer armed with a map and a compass that points towards the most challenging path. And of course, that’s the one she takes, until she finds an even more daunting one. Speaking with her, one ends up likening her to an eager hiker, in search of steeper, taller, scarier peaks.
The 12-year-old Nidhi who pored over psychology books would be far from surprised to know that she is now the Co-Founder and Director of Citizen Digital Foundation and deeply studies behavioural design in digital technologies. During the decades in between, she traversed exciting trails. As a young English Literature graduate from Kerala University, she worked as a copywriter and quickly noticed that writing and communication, blended with media, could cast quite a spell on the public. And there began her love for the media.
Following a Broadcasting Management program at MICA, Nidhi chose Mumbai as her next pitstop. “Working with Balaji Telefilms and UTV, I created shows, including some of the K-series; not the K-pop series of today, but the K-series of Ekta Kapoor,” she says, laughing. “I was an Executive Producer on shows such as Kahaani Ghar Ghar Ki, Shararat, and Full Toss. Before long, I moved into television programming. I enjoyed the intricate effort and craft that went into each scene. What passes in the blink of an eye on the screen is a tapestry of talent and effort spanning months.”
By the time Nidhi returned to her home in Kerala, where her partner lives, the magic of storytelling, like an octopus, had coiled its tentacles around her. Nidhi wielded her map and circled her next destination and the new big thing in media: FM radio. Radio Mirchi in Thiruvananthapuram was quick to assess her potential and appointed Nidhi as Programming Head. “We had to craft the entire content from scratch for a completely new market where Times of India and Radio Mirchi were external entities.” That is exactly what excited Nidhi, and she adds, “The journey was nothing short of fantastic.”
Then came a call from across the seas, beckoning Nidhi to Channel 4 Radio Network in Dubai to launch and establish a new FM channel as Station Head. Needless to say, she dived head-first into the challenge. “I established a completely new station called Gold FM, where a competitor was already quite successful. Our small team built everything, right from the name onwards, and ended up building a niche brand that is among the top stations today,” she says. And just like that, an entire decade of radio stints flew past.
At this point, Nidhi noticed that her compass was pointed far ahead. Although amid Dubai’s skyscrapers and blinking lights, her thoughts were occupied by the raging Syrian refugee crisis. “The single thing that sets war refugees apart from you and me is that one fine day, a bomb dropped upon their homes. It could happen to any of us, yet we sometimes see people seeking asylum as a less-than,” says Nidhi.
Nidhi had previously contributed to organisations engaged in rehabilitation of domestic abuse and child prostitution survivors as a writer and field volunteer. In Athens, Greece, she worked with a Norwegian NGO Dråpen i Havet (Drop In The Ocean) to help rehabilitate women and children escaping the Syrian and Afghan wars. “While distributing relief material and clothes delivered to us through the UN and the Red Cross, we had a strict policy by which clothes with so much as a minuscule spot were chucked. The idea was simple; people receiving aid are not to be considered any less than those extending aid. It was not about the little spot, it was about dignity,” says Nidhi.
Following a year of relief work, Nidhi set out to learn more about digital media and arrived at the threshold of Nottingham Business School for an MBA. Towards the end of the course, she found herself facing a quandary; on the one hand was the comfortable possibility of working at a top digital media company, and on the other hand, her increasing interest in the intersection of behavioural science and digital media. Her research during the MBA revealed a lack of information and media literacy, especially around data privacy, in India. Several rounds of conversations with her lecturers and much self-reflection later, she knew that the answer was dangling before her. There was work to be done in India.
“The start was far from smooth. I was hounded by a million doubts. Will this make sense? What if concerns surrounding data privacy don’t seem relevant to the public? Who will listen?” Nidhi recalls the days she weighed her options and stared at her new summit in awe. On finding a co-founder in Vijesh Ram and encouraged by the enthusiastic cheer from her partner, Nidhi began her ascent in August 2021.
For the first two years, Citizen Digital Foundation was self-funded. The co-founders leveraged their network to organise sessions for cabinet ministers, bureaucrats, teachers, and school and college students. By the end of the second year, funds began to trickle in. “In schools, we conduct Good Tech Squad events that normalise the conversation around cyber bullying, online harassment, and deep fakes through fun activities. We introduce evolving ideas and theories around tech and AI governance to bureaucrats, and business, law, media and engineering students to foster responsible innovation and tech development. So far, we have managed to sensitise over 4,000 people in the country about techno-social challenges,” says Nidhi.
It is her faith - an undying one in the goodness of humanity - that beats at the heart of her CDF story. “We prefer to transfer the blame for negative usage of digital media onto the people who are seemingly the perpetrators. However, all of us have good and bad sides. And some companies, in the guise of keeping us entertained, make a fortune from bringing out the worst in us, slowly fragmenting the fabric of societies and democracies,” she explains.
“Scams and frauds always feel like mishaps that occur to others and never to ourselves, don’t you think? But in reality, even a highly educated person can easily fall prey to a cleverly designed scam because we possess primal instincts, and messages are often personalised to speak to our unique emotions rather than our rational mind. Fear and anger make us vulnerable to manipulation and are the favourite weapons of junk technologies,” Nidhi says. “To put it simply, what makes us binge-watch shows on OTT platforms on our busiest day? If it was on television, there is every chance that we would get up during a commercial break and decide to turn off the television. On OTT, by the time you stretch, the next episode plays automatically, subtly eliminating your brain's ability to exercise its agency. The most fascinating aspects of marketing are linked to psychology. There are invisible leashes tying us to our devices, while we proceed with an illusion of choice.”
“Digitalisation and automation are here to stay. The issue looming over our society is that people fail to connect the problem of online mishaps with the root cause. So, what we advocate for is a system that makes fundamental human well-being to incentivise tech goals. Media literacy and information literacy should be part of school curriculum. Tech platforms must be accountable and transparent in their practices, and incorporate good governance if they truly want their customers to make the most of their products,” Nidhi sums up her thoughts.
It needs to be especially noted that as our adventurer treks ahead, the treacherous, wobbly rocks are many. One of the most prominent is the overlapping of online harassment and gender identity. “Growing up in Bihar and as a young adult in Kerala, I could never afford to not be conscious of my status as a woman. Women who speak their minds, break social stereotypes to get ahead, or create content online have always been at the receiving end of objectification and misogyny. And surely platforms swoop in to profit from that as well. The more you troll women, the more engagement you garner. The same applies to every historically oppressed community because of two factors: they are easy, almost designated, targets, and can be used for polarisation. This is a classic engagement tactic that most extractive digital platforms exploit,” explains Nidhi, connecting the concerns of CDF with existing social inequity.
Nidhi believes in educating youth and directing them towards a more responsible usage of technology and now AI. “If we band together and educate a whole new generation of students on alternative ways to build technologies in collaborative and productive ways, we might see the next wave of innovation being extremely positive,” she says. “I have an inherent belief in the ability of human beings to coordinate and resolve things. We have seen wars. We have seen famine. And despite all that seems to be going wrong, what with the warped incentives driving people apart, people do have the ability to band together and work in the interest of humanity. We see that in small pockets. It’s about making that a movement, like we have done in the past with junk food, automobile safety, or tobacco.”
Nevertheless, she is not one to give in to unchecked romanticisation. She says, “I find meaning and purpose in what I'm doing now. At the end of the day, I need to be able to look myself in the eye. And to that end, it is selfish because I'm doing what I'm most at peace with.” Signing off, she adds jestingly, “Now, I am waiting for an income so it would complete my ‘Ikigai’.”
Nidhi Sudhan is the Co-Founder and CEO of Citizen Digital Foundation, a non-profit organisation based in Thiruvananthapuram. Their three-member team fosters critical awareness among end-users of technology, accountability in tech business, and informed action among government officials and policymakers. Nidhi is listed among 100 Brilliant Women in AI Ethics™ 2024.
