Meet our Team!
Ankitha Cheerakathil
Founder & Director
Ankitha Cheerakathil is a dynamic policy practitioner and social entrepreneur whose work bridges youth empowerment, civic innovation and governance. As the Founder and Director of InnovaPolis, Ankitha leads transformative programs and civil society partnerships that equip young people with the tools to shape public policy and drive community-level change. Under her vision, InnovaPolis has become a hub for civic imagination — translating complex policy concepts into accessible, hands-on learning experiences that empower youth to become changemakers in democratic spaces.
Ankitha’s career spans international and interdisciplinary experience. She is currently a Policy Advisor to the provincial government of Ontario in Canada. Previously, she has worked with leading institutions such as the Center for the Advanced Study of India (University of Pennsylvania), Tallinn University in Estonia and the premier Czech thinktank Institute H21. Her initiatives have consistently centred around advancing research and practice in participatory democracy, municipal governance reform and citizen engagement to create resilient and equitable societies. Ankitha holds academic credentials from McGill University, Sciences Po and St. Stephen’s College (Delhi University).
Flavis Thomas Thommana
Co-Founder
Flavis Thomas Thommana is a distinguished product marketing leader and tech policy enthusiast in Canada whose work bridges innovation, purpose and impact. He is the Co-Founder of InnovaPolis. His work helps the InnovaPolis team to envision digital interfaces, online engagement platforms and tech innovations that deepen citizen participation. With his rare dual fluency in product marketing and tech policy, he stands as a compelling force at the intersection of innovation and governance, ready to drive forward ventures that are technologically sound, socially meaningful and future-oriented.
As Product Marketing Manager at Konica Minolta’s subsidiary IT Weapons, he brings strategic vision to complex technological offerings, translating features into narratives that resonate with diverse stakeholder segments. Flavis honed his skills at industry giants such as Cognizant and Gartner, where he engaged deeply with market research, competitive intelligence and technology adoption trends. These formative experiences refined his capacity to interpret emerging signals and to position products in ways that anticipate future demand. Flavis is an alumnus of IIT Roorkee and the University of Calicut.
Anirudh Dinesh
Advisor
Anirudh Dinesh is a Research Fellow at the Governance Lab. He is a member of the team designing and piloting experiments for new models of public engagement – what the GovLab calls people-led innovation – to improve the legitimacy and the effectiveness of policy making and to resolve urgent problems. Anirudh is a member of the CrowdLaw research team which examines how governments around the world are using technology to involve the public in legislative drafting and decision-making. He has authored multiple case studies documenting how institutions are using online crowdsourcing methods to improve their lawmaking processes through better community engagement. He has led online coaching programs including the Open Seventeen Challenge. Anirudh holds a Master’s in Computer Engineering from NYU.
Matthew D. Glasser
Advisor
Matthew Glasser is the Director for Municipal Law and Finance at the Centre for Urban Law and Finance in Africa (CULFA). He has worked with the National Treasury of South Africa for over 20 years, advising on policy issues related to local government finances, especially borrowing and financial emergencies. He was formerly Lead Urban Specialist in the World Bank where he managed urban strategic and research efforts in Eastern and Southern Africa. In this role, he led and contributed to a broad portfolio of urban operations including performance-based intergovernmental fiscal transfer systems, upgrading for informal settlements and strategic programmes focused on secondary cities. He provided technical assistance and advice to governments in India, Kenya, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania and Uganda. Currently he serves as a member of the International Advisory Committee at the Centre for Land Governance in the Indian Institute of Human Settlements. He is also an Extraordinary Research Fellow of the South African Chair in Cities, Law and Environmental Sustainability at the North-West University Faculty of Law.
Gabriela Benetkova
Advisor
Gabriela Benetkova is a lawyer and career diplomat at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic. As part of her diplomatic career, she was posted as the Head of the Consular Section at the Embassy of the Czech Republic in New Delhi (2017 – 2021) and as the Deputy Head of Mission at the Embassy of the Czech Republic (2022 – 2024). She also undertook short-term assignments in Lebanon, in the Philippines and in Ukraine. Her expertise is primarily focused on visa and consular affairs, with some experience in cultural diplomacy. She graduated from the Faculty of Law, University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, Czech Republic.