Media, Storytelling & Production Portfolio

Harini Sasikumar

Podcast host, writer and video storyteller — trained as an electrical engineer, building a career behind the microphone and in front of the camera.

Podcast Host Writer Video Creator Engineer
"The life we want always wants us back."
Portrait of Harini Sasikumar
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The Yatra — host
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About

Harini Sasikumar
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Harini is a final-year Electrical and Electronics Engineering student at Amrita School of Engineering, Coimbatore, now transitioning into media, storytelling and production — building a growing body of creative work as a podcast host, writer and video creator, and applying to the University of Westminster to formalise this direction through postgraduate study.

Applying for
MA Digital Media / MA Journalism
Currently
B.Tech EEE, final year
In progress
The Yatra · Medium · Hello, this is Nitra
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Statement of Purpose

My story with that life began at the age of six, standing on my school stage with a microphone in my hand, looking at an audience without realising that this moment would continue to find its way back to me. Growing up in a close-knit school community gave me something I value deeply — the opportunity to be seen, encouraged, make mistakes, learn from them and grow.

My undergraduate journey in Electrical and Electronics Engineering added a different light to my life. It taught me resilience, discipline, and most importantly the ability to stand back up when things did not go as planned. After many years, I had the opportunity to host our Freshers' Day — and something within me felt a sense of bliss again. It reminded me that one aspect of life does not define who we are; there is always another beautiful feather waiting to become part of our journey.

Each time I felt that I was falling back, my love for being behind a microphone or in front of a camera held me up. Through speaking, acting, writing, hosting and podcasting, I began to understand that my interest in media was not simply about being visible. I became fascinated by the process of transforming an idea into an experience: how a story is constructed, how a character can make an audience feel, how a voice can hold attention, and how a narrative can make people imagine themselves inside another world.

This is why I am particularly drawn to the MA Digital Media Storytelling and Production at the University of Westminster. The course does not approach media just as a process of creating content or following trends. Its emphasis on media storytelling, interactive and immersive media production, and narrative development resonates strongly with the way I want to understand storytelling. I want to create stories that invite people to feel, imagine and immerse themselves in the world being presented to them.

My idea for pursuing this course is not to become a creator who produces content simply to maintain constant visibility. I want to build a distinctive creative identity where my work speaks for itself. Whether through a carefully crafted story, a character, a performance, a podcast or an immersive experience, I want audiences to remember not only what they saw or heard, but how it made them feel.

Looking ahead, I hope to build an international career in media through collaboration, storytelling and creative production — bringing an Indian perspective onto a wider stage, while learning from stories, people and creative practices across cultures. I see my journey not as leaving one field behind for another, but as bringing different parts of myself together to create something new. I take this as my turn.

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Writing

Published opinion and reflective pieces on career, storytelling and media ethics.

The Person Standing Before the Camera Is Also Human!

An argument for more empathetic, less celebrity-obsessed journalism — and what real interviewing should look like.

Read on Medium →

What Really Matters at the End of the Long Streets…

A personal reflection on choosing an unconventional career path over a "safe" one — for anyone told to be realistic.

Read on Medium →

Are We Knocking the Right Way?

For Electron, the Amrita EEE department magazine — arguing for portfolio-based evaluation over entrance exams.

Pending publication
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The Yatra

A personal interview podcast exploring people's journeys, crafts and perspectives through honest, unhurried conversation. Harini hosts, researches guests, develops questions and edits each episode.

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Carnatic Music Teacher

A conversation exploring a life spent teaching and performing Carnatic music.

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Dr. Kalaivani — Dermatologist

A conversation with a dermatologist cousin about medicine, career and personal journey.

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Yoga Instructor — link to be added

A conversation exploring the practice and philosophy of yoga instruction.

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Video — YouTube & Reels

Selected Works Playlist

A curated playlist of five videos: the channel's origin story, first intro video, and three podcast episodes.

Watch on YouTube

Short-Form Video

Two reels demonstrating range in fast-paced, short-format storytelling.

Links to be added

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Upcoming Book

HELLO, THIS IS NITRA

Hello, this is Nitra

A semi-autobiographical book in progress, developed chapter by chapter, exploring identity and personal journey through a confirmed central character.

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CV

Two sides of the same story — the creative practice and the engineering training it grew out of.

Profile

Final-year Electrical and Electronics Engineering student transitioning into media and storytelling, with hands-on experience hosting a podcast, writing for Medium, and producing content on YouTube. Brings an engineering background's discipline and problem-solving into creative work centred on interviewing, narrative and audience connection.

Experience

Host & Creator, The Yatra (Podcast)

Ongoing

Research, guest outreach, question development, hosting and light editing.

Writer, Medium

Ongoing

Personal and opinion pieces on career, storytelling and media ethics.

Creator, YouTube

Ongoing

Original video content including reflective pieces and podcast episodes; two short-form reels.

Author (upcoming), Hello, this is Nitra

In progress

Semi-autobiographical book, developed chapter by chapter.

Academic Background

B.Tech, Electrical and Electronics Engineering — Amrita School of Engineering, Coimbatore. CGPA 6.82. Expected 2027.
Final-year project: Comparative Investigation of Signal Processing and AI Techniques for PMSM Stator Inter-Turn Fault Diagnosis — Supervisor: Dr. Praveen Kumar N.

Skills & Languages

Media

Interviewing, on-camera hosting, podcast production, scriptwriting, storytelling, basic video/audio editing.

Technical

MATLAB, ANSYS Maxwell, signal processing, data analysis.

Languages

Tamil (native), English (fluent), Hindi.

Certifications

KNOSOLAR — Solar PV Training Certification.

Career Objective

Inspired Electrical and Electronics Engineering student passionate about solar PV systems, electrical machines, and TinyML edge computing for power electronics — interested in embedded systems, IoT monitoring, real-time ML deployment, and renewable energy modelling.

Selected Projects

Edge-Based Knee Rehabilitation Monitoring Using Wearable IMU Sensor and ML

Wearable ESP32 system classifying knee flexion angles in real time; 99.6% confidence, 15ms on-device inference, 99.99% BLE data reduction.

ARIES-CAN: Real-time Intrusion Detection for CAN Data Using Ensemble Learning

Hybrid AdaBoost–Random Forest IDS for IoV CAN bus traffic; 100% accuracy, precision, recall and F1-score detecting DoS and spoofing attacks.

Smart Factory Patrol Robot with Multi-Sensor Monitoring and Computer Vision Surveillance

Autonomous ESP32-based line-follower robot with obstacle avoidance, RFID localization, environmental monitoring and human detection.

Integrated Short-Term Electrical Load Forecasting and Economic Dispatch

ANFIS/ANN load forecasting (MAE ≈ 4.87 kW, R² ≈ 0.999) integrated with linear-programming-based economic dispatch.

Active Power Factor Correction for Single-Phase EV Charger Rectifier

Simscape-modelled rectifier and boost converter with PI-based current-mode control; ~0.998–0.999 power factor, ~3% THD.

Comparative Analysis of MPPT Algorithms for PV Systems

Compared four MPPT techniques for a solar PV–boost converter system under varying irradiance.

Skills

Modeling & Simulation

MATLAB, Simulink, Simscape Power System, ESP32, Arduino Uno, Raspberry Pi.

Data & ML

Python, ML (ensembles, TinyML, ANFIS, ANN), feature engineering, model evaluation, Edge Impulse.

General

Problem solving, technical documentation, team collaboration.

Education

B.Tech, Electrical and Electronics Engineering — Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Coimbatore. CGPA 6.82. Graduating 2027.
Higher Secondary — Aditya International School, Coimbatore. 78.2%, 2021–2023.