Op-Eds

Daily wage labourers in Delhi-NCR were the most disadvantaged during the lockdown and are still finding it hard to find work. But even among the salaried class work participation rates remain far below pre-lockdown levels As India’s economy limps back to life combating pandemic fears and fixing transport and logistical challenges may be key to...   Read More

Ensuring food security is critical at the juncture. Providing universal PDS is financially feasible as FCI has more stock than we need   The NCAER Quarterly Review of the Economy June 2020 has estimated that despite the ₹20 trillion Atmanirbhar Bharat package the economy in all likelihood will suffer from negative growth and elevated inflation...   Read More

Regulations of industrial municipal inflow in Ganga at the centre of pollution mitigation policies have dissociated rivers from riverine communities. The quality of water in rivers Ganga and Yamuna did not improve despite four decades of pollution-mitigation measures. But they did within 10 days of the nationwide lockdown imposed to curb the spread of the...   Read More

Placing money in the hands of people could help save lives as our economy looks set to shrink this year and possibly the next. The coronavirus pandemic reached India late giving us a chance to learn from the experience of countries where it had spread earlier. Drawing on that experience an unprecedented country-wide lockdown was...   Read More

India has disappointed itself hugely in the way it handled the migrant labour issue. Why is the government being so tight-fisted in its support for the poor? Scenes of migrant labour returning home thirsty hungry and helpless shall be a scar on India forever. Images of men women and children walking in 44 degrees Celsius...   Read More

This sector has developed locally without following global standards.  Most players agree that setting standards and their voluntary adoption are the only way for reducing costs After the extended lockdown necessitated by the need to contain the spread of the deadly Coronavirus in the country the process of kick-starting the economy has now commenced in...   Read More

Reverse migration is one side of the story. Workers with chronic ailments residing within States can also pose a risk Labour as a factor of production is a valuable service rendered by a human agent in the production of goods and services. The outcome is generation of wealth and welfare. In common parlance the term...   Read More

Surveys show that the govt’s support schemes do not reach such households. Direct cash transfers and universal PDS will help As details of the stimulus package recently announced by Nirmala Sitharaman begin to emerge it appears that there is a serious mismatch between the areas and groups most affected by the Covid-related lockdown and the...   Read More

If Bihar’s example is anything to go by simply repealing the APMC Act is not enough to benefit farmers. There is a need to move from notional to functional FPOs In the Covid-19 relief package finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has focused on a number of capacity building measures for the agriculture sector—such as the Agriculture...   Read More

We may have to take recourse to some extraordinary sources to finance the exceptional spending needed to revive growth Policymakers have to decide if they want higher growth along with other pain points or a little less growth but also less pain that would have to be borne later on In my column last month...   Read More