NCAER has been organising the annual C.D. Deshmukh Memorial Lecture to honour Sir Chintaman Dwarakanath Deshmukh, one of India’s most eminent economists and one of its founding fathers.

The first such lecture titled “Grassroots Welfare Schemes and Macroeconomic Choices: India’s Dilemmas” was delivered on 4 January 2013 by Professor Kaushik Basu, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of the World Bank and a Non-resident Senior Fellow at NCAER. Dr Rakesh Mohan, a member of the Board of Executive Directors at the International Monetary Fund, and a former Director General of NCAER, was the Guest of Honour.

Past lectures in this series have been delivered by stalwarts like Professor Kaushik Basu, Professor Arvind Panagariya, Dr David M. Malone, Dr Raghuram Rajan, Sir Partha Dasgupta, Dr Vijay Kelkar, Mr Martin Wolf, Dr David Lipton, and Dr Gita Gopinath, on key contemporary economic issues and ideas.

Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman, Hon. Minister for Finance and Minister for Corporate Affairs, delivered the 10^th annual C.D. Deshmukh Lecture at NCAER on 6 August 2026, at the 23^rd edition of NCAER’s flagship conference, the India Policy Forum. She reflected on the major milestones of India’s economic journey over the years, highlighting how global trends and domestic developments have shaped the country’s growth trajectory. She also congratulated NCAER on its 70^th anniversary, noting that the institution was established in 1956 with the support of the Ministry of Finance. more…