Much of the media coverage of Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan’s recent speech in Goa focused on his use of the Hitler example to illustrate how a strong government does not always work in the interests of the country. On the contrary, Rajan’s speech really was about why we urgently need a strong government. See…
This is my latest livemint column, also cross-posted on the WB Public Sphere *** A recently published Lancet paper looks at the impact of the erstwhile Total Sanitation Campaign in the coastal Puri district in Odisha. The study finds that the government’s rural sanitation programme, implemented by NGOs and community-based organisations, was unable to reduce…
In October 2012, this is what I had written about Arvind Kejriwal Arvind Kejriwal is the man of the moment. Its close to the end of the year and surely, in the annual lists that media houses love to publish, Kejriwal’s place at the very top is all but guaranteed. His recent foray into politics…
Karthik Muralidharan interviews Kaushik Basu, touching on a range of topics around evidence, policy and implementation. On ‘ideas’ beyond interests: One of the things I became convinced of was what Keynes had talked about – vested interests are important but even more important are ideas that are ossified in the head. I do feel that if…
What depths can the Modi-Shah duo sink to? Disrespectful, uncivil and disgusting, but not in the least surprising.
This is my latest livemint column *** Melinda and Bill Gates have made an annual tradition of publishing their thoughts on international development and its key challenges. Given the substance, I assume these letters reflect an annual manifesto for the organisation they head, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF). Last year, I wrote about…
This is my latest Livemint column Given Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s public utterances accepting mythology as evidence of ancient India’s scientific achievements, it should not be surprising that for the current government, evaluations and learning don’t seem to play an important role in policymaking. Recently, speaking at a public event, Reserve Bank of India governor…
PK is a timely movie – a message on the folly of organised religion that needs to be spread far and wide. Box office wise, it has the commercial might of Chopra – Hirani – Aamir (more later on how that may be their undoing). PK entertains, but how compelling is it in terms of…
The proposal for Team India, the body to replace the Planning Commission is a sanitized technocratic proposal, perfectly suited for a game of development bingo – this is my latest livemint column *** Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his recent meeting with chief ministers, presented a proposal for revamping the Planning Commission. The least we…
Last month, insurgents killed more than 60 people in north-east Kenya. This is only the latest in a wave of violent incidents heightening insecurity along the remote Somali-Kenyan border. The north-east is one of the poorest regions in Kenya. Weak infrastructure and limited public services are exacerbated by banditry and insurgency. The national primary school…
Akshay Mangla has a great article on the Government of India’s biometric attendance tracking system: …One must ask whether attendance is a high enough bar, and whether the benefits of meeting that bar through instruments like surveillance outweigh the costs. The costs involve a downward dynamic in which institutionalized distrust induces further suspicion and fear…
This is my latest livemint column *** In what can only be described as quite a stinging attack, a recent Mint column took on the intelligence and the motivations of activists in India. Accusing the likes of Medha Patkar of misguided activism that has created a “mess (that) will take some time to be sorted…
