Shamika Ravi, 44, Economist
Early on in the outbreak, many researchers used the alarm over Covid-19 to paint apocalyptic scenarios over how the disease would fare in the country. Much of this was based on little or no evidence. Shamika Ravi didn't get into that game. She did not try to divine what might happen the following day. Instead, she looked into the numbers, calmly and dispassionately, and told us what was happening that day. A professor of economics at a business school and a researcher at a think-tank, she has used social media to lay out the trajectory of the disease in the country. Ravi has done this by looking at vast swathes of data from across India and designing a wide array of charts and metrics that examine not just what is happening nationally but also in individual cities and states. As the disease has grown, Ravi has emerged as its most objective chronicler.