19 December, 2018Does political reservation for women improve programme delivery?
This column outlines results of a study that assesses the impact of women leaders on corruption and other aspects of the quality of delivery of MNREGA. It argues that administrative experience, traini...
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Farzana Afridi 
17 January, 2013
- Articles
Oral democracy
Critical scrutiny of the challenges of electoral democracy including elite capture, corruption, and patronage has led to a revival of the idea of direct democracy – giving power directly to groups o...
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Vijayendra Rao Paromita Sanyal
- 24 April, 2019
- Articles
Do roads bring votes in rural India?
A large-scale rural roads programme in India has provided access to over two-third of villages that lacked a paved road in 2001. Do citizens reward incumbent governments electorally for these improvem...
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Tanushree Goyal
- 26 April, 2019
- Articles
Religion and relief in Muzzafarnagar
The communal riots that broke out in Muzzafarnagar in the state of Uttar Pradesh in September last year took several lives and left hundreds homeless. In this Note from the Field, Rohini Somanathan s...
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Rohini Somanathan
- 10 January, 2014
- Notes
Unintended consequences of India's child labour ban
Bans and regulations against child labour are among the most popular policy tools used to address the problem throughout the developing world. But how well do they work in practice? This column analy...
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Prashant Bharadwaj Leah K. Lakdawala Nicholas Li
- 08 January, 2014
- Articles
Some reflections on the National Food Security Act
The Food Security Bill became an Act with little parliamentary opposition. Yet the public debate has lingered. Would subsidised food grains reduce malnutrition? Won’t it be better to invest in heal...
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Ashok Kotwal Milind Murugkar Bharat Ramaswami
- 10 December, 2013
- Perspectives
A suggestion for WTO negotiations
India’s new food security law is likely to breach WTO’s limit on farmer support. India is keen to ask for a temporary exemption from the rule so that the law can be implemented unhindered. But, i...
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Ashok Kotwal Milind Murugkar Bharat Ramaswami
- 02 December, 2013
- Perspectives
Estimating the nutritional impact of the Food Security Bill
The provisions of the new National Food Security Bill seek to expand the value and reach of food subsidies provided through the Public Distribution System. This column analyses the nutritional impact...
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Tara Kaul
- 18 November, 2013
- Articles
Connecting India's youth with development in red bastions
The Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fellowship is an initiative of the Ministry of Rural Development that recruits young professionals to work with local governments for grassroots development i...
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Varad Pande
- 13 November, 2013
- Notes
Doing a number on the Food Security Bill
In a recent article, Kotwal, Murugkar and Ramaswami pointed out errors in estimation by Surjit Bhalla that led him to assert that the Food Security Bill will increase cost of food subsidy by 336%, an...
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Ashok Kotwal Milind Murugkar Bharat Ramaswami
- 11 November, 2013
- Perspectives
How can Indians be happier?
The recently released World Happiness Report 2013 seeks to go beyond Gross Domestic Product and the Human Development Index to understand what really matters to people for their well-being. It is fou...
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Nirvikar Singh
- 30 October, 2013
- Perspectives
Why did the Indian economy stagnate under the colonial rule?
How did the Indian economy fare under the colonial rule? Is the average Indian significantly better off after Independence? This column examines trends in GDP per capita in order to determine the stan...
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Aniruddha Bagchi
- 16 September, 2013
- Articles
Economists on the wrong foot
This article asserts that the Sen-Bhagwati debate misses out two crucial elements – communities as agents of development, and ecological sustainability. It emphasises the importance of community em...
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Ashish Kothari Aseem Shrivastava
- 11 September, 2013
- Perspectives
Litigation over Eminent Domain Compensation
In the recent past, use of Eminent Domain to acquire land for developmental purposes has become highly controversial. Several parts of India have experienced violent protests against the compulsory ac...
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Ram Singh
- 01 September, 2013
- IGC Research on India
Correct costs of the Food Security Bill
In a recent article, Surjit Bhalla has asserted that the Food Security Bill will increase costs of food grain subsidy by 336%. Correcting errors in his calculation brings this figure down to 18%. In t...
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Ashok Kotwal Milind Murugkar Bharat Ramaswami
- 28 August, 2013
- Perspectives
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Caste dominance in rural India: Cause and effect
Rural India remains a caste-based society. This column explores why caste continues to play such an important role and what the effects are. It argues that trade and agricultural productivity suffer, ...
- Siwan Anderson
- 16 August, 2012
- Articles
Rural development programmes: Implementation challenges and solutions
With a majority of the population living in rural areas in India, rural development is key to the development of the country. Based on his experience of working closely with the district administratio...
- Pushkar Pahwa
- 17 March, 2017
- Perspectives
Governance and public service delivery in India
The International Growth Centre recently produced a synthesis paper (Afridi 2017) bringing together insights from its research on governance and public service delivery in India, over the past seven y...
- Farzana Afridi Nalini Gulati
- 07 August, 2017
- Perspectives