Over the last 15 years, Mekhala’s research, publications, policy and professional engagements have involved work within and across a range of field sites and subjects, including women's courts and dispute resolution, community health workers and public health systems, agriculture and agricultural markets, and water, livelihood security and land acquisition. This has placed her in a variety of roles at the intersections of and in partnerships between academia, public policy, government, the private sector, and grassroots civil society organizations.
As an anthropologist, Mekhala work engages most deeply with classical and contemporary questions animating the anthropology of the state and market. Her doctoral research and current book project explores the changing social, economic and political lives and relationships of an agricultural market/mandi in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Prior to joining Ashoka, she taught in the Department of Sociology, Shiv Nadar University.