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Poverty & Inequality

DUET re-examined

  • Perspectives

Covid-19: Addressing stigma and misconceptions

Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic in India, there has been stigmatisation of patients and their families, and discriminatory attitudes towards marginalised groups as well as frontline workers. Based on...

  • Articles

Energy access for marginalised communities: Evidence from rural India

While overall energy access of Indian households has improved rapidly over the past decade, access to clean fuel is still low as compared to electricity. Besides, social structures and hierarchies con...

  • Articles

Covid-19: How well are government schemes supporting Bihar’s vulnerable populations?

The immediate adverse impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and associated lockdown was visibly greater for migrant workers and their households, whose ability to access government schemes in their villages...

  • Notes from the Field
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Impact of MNREGA on labour markets

There is an active, ongoing debate on whether MNREGA should be retained in its current form. This column reports on research which suggests that MNREGA increased rural and urban wages and reduced sea...

  • Articles

Workfare as an effective way to fight poverty: The case of India's MNREGA

The fundamental appeal of a workfare programme, vis-à-vis a welfare programme, is that it helps in targeting the beneficiaries. This column assesses the welfare impact of MNREGA on poor rural househ...

  • Articles

MNREGA's swan song: Not everyone's idea of achche din

Over the last few months, the central government announced a set of measures to restrict MNREGA. The rationale essentially revolves around corruption in the scheme and lack of economic viability. In ...

  • Perspectives

(Mis)Leading attack on MNREGA

Bhagwati and Panagariya have argued for phasing out MNREGA in favour of cash transfers. In this article, Abreu et al. contend that the argument is based on inflating the costs of the programme and de...

  • Perspectives

Switching to sanitation in South Asia: A study of health technology adoption (a seed study)

Open defecation in rural India presents a puzzle: India has far higher open defecation rates than other developing regions where people are poorer, literacy rates are lower, and water is more scarce.

  • IGC Research on India

A critical assessment of the Rangarajan Panel Report on poverty measurement

An expert committee headed by C Rangarajan was appointed by the government to rethink poverty measurement in India. This column provides a critical assessment of the recently released report of the C...

  • Articles

Is the proposed restructuring of MNREGA desirable?

The rural development ministry plans to restrict MNREGA to the 200 most backward districts, and reduce the wage component of the total expenditure of the programme. In this article, Ashwini Kulkarni ...

  • Perspectives

The 'urban sprawl' and declining rural-urban inequality

India has experienced rapid urbanisation in the past three decades. Has urbanisation impacted the economic wellbeing of rural and urban workers? This column finds that the rural-urban wage gap has sh...

  • Articles

Please weight

The latest wealth index by New World Wealth that looks at multimillionaires has ranked India eighth in the global rich list. This article contends that looking at absolute numbers may be misleading. ...

  • Perspectives

Squaring the poverty circle

An expert group headed by C Rangarajan has recommended a poverty measurement methodology for India. In this article, Deaton and Drèze argue that the method proposed by the expert group to set povert...

  • Perspectives

MNREGA: Populist leaky bucket or successful anti-poverty programme?

MNREGA – the world’s largest workfare programme - formed the backbone of the UPA government’s anti-poverty programme, and may well represent its most important legacy in the long run. This colu...

  • Articles

The plight of 'complimentary' migrants: Children at brick kilns

Migration for work is meant to benefit families of migrant workers. But what if the families migrate along with the worker? Based on visits to brick kilns in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Prade...

  • Notes from the Field

Recent Contributors

Deepak

Deepak Saraswat

The University of Connecticut

Anna

Anna Custers

World Bank

Prathap

Prathap Kasina

Innovations for Poverty Action

Anjali P.

Anjali P. Verma

University of Texas at Austin

Pulapre

Pulapre Balakrishnan

Ashoka University

Mausumi

Mausumi Das

Delhi School of Economics

M.

M. Parameswaran

Centre for Development Studies

Soumi Roy

Soumi Roy Chowdhury

National Council of Applied Economic Research

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Most Popular Poverty & Inequality Posts

Covid-19: What can be done immediately to help vulnerable population

With over 80% of India’s workforce employed in the informal sector and one-third working as casual labour, Covid-19's spread and subsequent unplanned lockdowns, have created economic havoc in the li...

  • Perspectives

EWS reservation in higher education: Affirmative action or vote bank politics?

The Constitution (103rd Amendment) Act, 2019, provides for 10% reservation for the economically weaker sections (EWS) in higher educational institutions within the general category. In this post, Devi...

  • Perspectives

Lockdown, life, and livelihood in the times of Corona

After around 36 hours of the lockdown to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in India, the Finance Minister announced a slew of welfare measures amounting to Rs. 1.7 trillion to support the vulnerable popu...

  • Perspectives