Op-Eds

Agricultural waste has latent value but is often treated as a disposal problem. What are the core market and policy distortions in India that prevent by-product markets (e.g. bio-inputs, bioenergy, biomaterials) from emerging at scale, and how should policy reframe incentives to internalise environmental and social benefits? Agricultural residues, such as straw, husk, and dung,...   Read More

Schemes to raise women’s workforce participation will come a cropper unless men actively take part in domestic work. Even as policy efforts are being oriented towards ‘Viksit Bharat 2047’through women-led development, a large chunk of women in India remains absent from paid employment, a reality that undermines both gender equality and economic growth. Over the...   Read More

The Malviya Nagar incident prompts reflection not only on enforcement, but on whether India’s legislative framework adequately recognises racial harm. The recent assault on a young woman from Arunachal Pradesh in Delhi’s Malviya Nagar is not merely another criminal incident. It revives a policy question India formally acknowledged in 2014 but has yet to resolve...   Read More

What borrowed capital builds matters as much as what sovereigns owe African debt debates have become precise on the liability side – volumes, maturities, currencies, spreads and restructuring mechanics. What gets treated as background is the other side of the balance sheet: what is financed by that borrowing and whether those uses of borrowed funds...   Read More

The year 2025 has become a turning point in the evolution of scholarly publishing; artificial intelligence has begun to transition from experimental add-on to a central component of editorial workflows. In this year alone, journal editors, reviewers, and authors have been confronted with the demands of negotiating a rapidly transforming landscape, in which AI-driven systems...   Read More

A digital economy needs a blend of both: algorithms assess client risk profiles and ensure suitable recommendations, human oversight adds value. The debate pitting robo-advisors against human advisors is often about competition and not so much about complementarity. Today, advice is free-floating. When it comes to financial advice, people prefer a second opinion as it...   Read More

Indians are watching more frequently but in shorter, more distracted bursts. In the late 1980s, when Ramayan aired every Sunday morning on Doordarshan, India paused as one. Streets emptied, tea kettles boiled in unison, and neighbours gathered around a single television set in the mohalla or village chaupal. That screen did not isolate; it assembled....   Read More

A background note can be accessed here: OECD: Skills Use in Workplace Productivity gains depend as much on expanding skills as on aligning firm-level demand and institutional incentives to ensure effective utilisation. In India’s labour market, where formal credentialing coexists with large informal employment, what institutional or employer-side practices perpetuate skill misuse, and how should policy...   Read More

Little emphasis on project preparation, resorting to asset monetisation sans guardrails, narrow financing base are pain points. The Union Budget has reaffirmed India’s reliance on public capital expenditure as the central pillar of its growth strategy. Public investment has expanded rapidly over the past five years. Central government capital expenditure has risen sharply in both...   Read More

The result is a persistent gap in labour force participation. Despite recent improvements, women’s participation remains well below its potential, especially in urban areas and in higher-productivity sectors. India has begun to acknowledge an inconvenient truth about its economy: growth cannot be sustained without bringing more women into paid work. The Union Budget 2026 reflects...   Read More