Amruta Karambelkar was a research associate (Feb 2019- Jun 2022) with the Indo-Pacific cluster at the VIF. Her interests lie in maritime issues, naval developments and the area focus is Indian Ocean, Southeast Asia and the larger Indo-Pacific region. She is pursuing her doctorate from the Centre for Indo-Pacific Studies, SIS on JNU. Her MPhil dissertation examined military build-up of Vietnam and Singapore from 1992 to 2012. She holds masters degree in political science from University of Pune. She has previous experience of working with the Indian Council of World Affairs.