Archives: People
Jyoti Thakur
Jyoti Thakur is an Associate Fellow at NCAER. She holds a Ph.D. in Development Studies from the Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bangalore, a Master’s degree from Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), and a Bachelor’s degree from Miranda House, University of Delhi. Her work extensively addresses gender inequalities in the labour market, social justice, and the socioeconomic impacts of gender-based disparities. She has worked at various research and academic institutions, including Gautam Budha University, Tata Institute of Social Sciences; and Praja Foundation.
She has published extensively, and her recent works include articles in SN Social Sciences and the Indian Journal of Gender Studies, alongside editorials in The Hindu Business Line, Indian Express and Deccan Herald, etc.
Shekhar Aiyar
Shekhar Aiyar is a Visiting Professor at NCAER, a Visiting Scholar at the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Johns Hopkins University, and a Non-Resident Fellow at Bruegel.
Until August 2023, he held a number of senior positions in the International Monetary Fund, most recently as Division Chief in the Research Department, where he helped coordinate the Fund’s monitoring of the global economy and liaised with international groups such as the G-20 and G-7. Previously, he served as Mission Chief for Germany and Head of the Euro Area Division. From 2009-2011, he was seconded to the Bank of England, where he studied cross-border bank flows and helped set up the macro-prudential regime.
His research interests encompass open economy macroeconomics, international finance, growth empirics, and test cricket. His recent work has focused on the likelihood and possible consequences of geo-economic fragmentation. He has published in the Journal of Financial Economics, American Economic Review, European Economic Review, IMF Economic Review, Journal of Economic Growth, Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, and Economic Policy. He holds an MA in Philosophy and Economics from Oxford University, and a PhD in Economics from Brown University.
Sapna Desai
Ashish Desai
Ashish Desai has over 25 years’ experience in the areas of technology, digital payments, and credit and microfinance. His leadership experience includes running P&L and building greenfield technology-driven businesses in mobile financial services, covering remittances, payments, and microlending across the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia. He has served as Director of Monitoring and Evaluation at the Development Monitoring and Evaluation Office (DMEO), NITI Aayog, where he was responsible for the monitoring and evaluation of all trade, finance, and commerce ministries and departments. His corporate experience spans diverse organisations, including the Aditya Birla Group, First Rand Bank, Jumo, and Motorola. He evangelized and founded the Mobiquity mobile money platform for Mahindra Comviva (erstwhile Bharti Telesoft), which has deployments in over 45 countries and over 100 million registered users. He holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute (VJTI), Mumbai, and an MBA from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai.
Ashish holds a PhD in Economics from Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode.
Research Interest – Technology and Digital Public Infrastructure