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Governance

Are independent candidates unimportant for political representation?

  • Articles

Does 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...

  • Articles

Food subsidy – PDS, cash, or both?

Should food subsidies – currently availed in the form of subsidised cereals – be given out in the form of cash instead? In this post, Krishna and Agrawal contend that rather than asking this binar...

  • Perspectives

Indian economy: High performer or Potemkin village?

The recent schizophrenic commentary on the health of the Indian economy raises questions on the true state: Is India doing really well or are we just seeing an impressive facade? In this post, Amartya...

  • Perspectives
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Unique Health Identification and Aadhaar: A case for mandatory linkage

As part of the Digital India initiative, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) issues a Unique Health Identification (UHID) number to each patient, which documents their entire journey in th...

  • Perspectives

Do Gram Panchayat leaders favour their own constituencies in MNREGA fund allocation?

Political incentives are known to play a role in the allocation of public resources from upper- to lower-tier governments. This column seeks to examine whether ruling parties in local governments favo...

  • Articles

Governance performance of Indian states: 2001-02 and 2011-12

Defining governance as service delivery, this column develops a measure of the quality of governance – also adjusting for the impact of the level of development - and provides a ranking of major Ind...

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The devil is in the details: Successes and limitations of bureaucratic reform

To address absenteeism among staff at public healthcare facilities, the government of Karnataka introduced an innovative biometric device to monitor and enforce attendance rules. This column presents ...

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Politician's pain is poor man's gain: Income distribution in close-election constituencies

Studies have highlighted the role of electoral competition in directing the flow of public funds. Analysing data from India, this column finds lower income inequality and polarisation in tightly conte...

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Surrogacy bill: Implications and way forward

Contributing to the ongoing debate on India’s surrogacy bill, Dutta and Sarkar discuss the potential implications of the bill on the country’s billion-dollar surrogacy industry. They contend that ...

  • Perspectives

Improving School Governance at Scale: A Randomized Evaluation of the Madhya Pradesh School Quality Assessment Program

Weak governance is a critical constraint in delivering quality education in developing countries. This project conducts a randomised evaluation of one of the most ambitious recent attempts by a develo...

  • IGC Research on India

Can the female sarpanch deliver? Evidence from Maharashtra

One-third of all seats in village councils are reserved for women. The government has proposed an increase in quota to 50%, and in the period of reservation from five to 10 years. Based on a survey co...

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Banning commercial surrogacy in India

In an attempt to protect the welfare of surrogate mothers, the Indian government has proposed to introduce legislation that will ban commercial surrogacy in the country. In this article, Ajit Karnik, ...

  • Perspectives

The Political Effects of Programmatic Development Policy: Can Bihar Break the Clientelist Trap?

This project aims to understand the conditions of supporting the continuation and expansion of programmatic governance in Bihar state. Bihar’s "clientelism trap" (incentives to return to clientelist...

  • IGC Research on India

Modi and his challenges: Leading India on its march to prosperity

Despite Narendra Modi’s successful leadership as Chief Minister of Gujarat, some question his ability to achieve the same progress at the national level as India’s Prime Minister. In this article,...

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Building connections: Political corruption and road construction in India

Rural infrastructure programmes of the government create new opportunities for growth but also for corruption. This column studies India’s flagship rural road construction programme and finds eviden...

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Maulik Jagnani

Cornell University

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Aditya Dasgupta

University of California, Merced

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University of Virginia

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University of California, San Diego

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Diane Coffey

University of Texas

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Payal Hathi

University of California, Berkeley

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research institute for compassionate economics

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Most Popular Governance Posts

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, ...

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Charting a course for the Indian economy

Karthik Muralidharan (Associate Professor of Economics, University of California, San Diego) speaks with Arvind Subramanian (Chief Economic Adviser, Government of India) on a broad set of issues rang...

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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...

  • Perspectives