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The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act: is it working?

MNREGA is one of the government´s largest flagship schemes, and is the largest job creation programme of its kind in the world. Supporters believe that it is necessary to help rural workers smooth inc...

  • Symposium

Formally insuring the informally insured

Rainfall is critical for the livelihoods of millions of Indians – yet many have no formal insurance if the rains fail. This column looks at what happens when a new formal insurance policy based on the...

  • Articles

South Asia's bottom half billion

South Asia has more people in extreme poverty than Sub-Saharan Africa. This column asks why such conditions continue in the second fastest growing region in the world. It argues that growth is extreme...

  • Articles

Where have all the young girls gone? The rise in female foeticide in India

Gender inequality remains a huge issue in India and policies aimed at changing this are welcome. But this column finds that an unintended consequence of the introduction and spread of ultrasound scans...

  • Articles

Agricultural wages and MNREGA: Exploring the myth

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, India’s flagship programme that guarantees 100 days of minimum wage employment to rural households, has come under attack for pushing up the...

  • Articles

Himayat - A silent skills revolution in the making

In this Note from the Field, Varad Pande of the Ministry of Rural Development discusses the Himayat programme in Jammu and Kashmir which offers skills-training and a job to unemployed young people in ...

  • Notes from the Field

Political Clientelism and Government Accountability in West Bengal: Theory and Evidence

This project provide a theory of political clientelism, which explains sources and determinants of political clientelism, the relationship between clientelism and elite capture, and their respective c...

  • IGC Research on India

The root of poverty: Ruinous healthcare costs

While natural disasters and political turmoil rightly grab our attention, this column shows that it is everyday events that drag most people into poverty. For many, the first of these is illness and t...

  • Articles

The fight against left-wing extremism

In this Note From the Field, Varad Pande of the Ministry of Rural Development argues that left-wing extremism and violence is a major challenge for India. He says that while this is definitely a secur...

  • Notes from the Field

Multi-dimensional deprivation in India: Comparisons with China and Vietnam

While several studies have compared India with China on economic measures such as GDP per capita, this column looks at a measure of people’s deprivation across a wide range of indicators. It finds Ind...

  • Articles

Microfinance and predatory lending: The same old story?

Once hailed as a near-miraculous way of lending money to the poor, microfinance is now often seen as exploitation – and governments are stepping in. This column looks at another point in India’s histo...

  • Articles

The political economies of land acquisition

India is in the process of reforming the way that land is bought and sold – a source of heated debate as many blame the current laws for unfairly forcing millions from their homes and livelihoods. Thi...

  • Articles