-Frontline.in Interview with R.B. Barman, former Chairperson, National Statistical Commission. R.B. Barman, former Chairperson of the National Statistical Commission (NSC), was member of the Indian Statistical Service before joining the Reserve Bank of India in 1979. He was president of the Indian Econometric Society in 2006-07, Vice Chairman, Irving Fisher Committee on Central Bank Statistics, Bank for International Settlement, Basel, Switzerland, and Member, International Data Forum. He sent a paper to Prime...

-The Hindu Business Line The government should explain constant variations in GDP figures. India’s reputation for data credibility could suffer “The (revised GDP) numbers are the result of a hatchet job” tweeted former Finance Minister P Chidambaram after the Modi government published the back-series GDP data late November. Ahmed Patel, his colleague in the Congress party, added his bit: ‘In its desperate attempt to re-write GDP data, the government resembles a student...

-Frontline.in Hidden in the Modi government’s Budget promises to India’s farmers, who are in distress, is the admission: we have failed you. No section of society has perhaps fared worse under the Narendra Modi regime than small peasants and agricultural labourers. Rural India, particularly peasants, voted in large numbers for the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in 2014. Once in power, the NDA government promised to double the incomes...

-The Indian Express My resignation from National Statistical Commission was the last act in a long story of disregard for its reports William Setzer, in the working paper, “Politics and Statistics: Independence, Dependence or Interaction”, published by the UN, lists several possible areas where political interference in official data generation and publication can happen. One of these is the extent and timing of release of data. He cites several examples. Most...

-The Hindu Strengthening the MGNREGA would be more prudent than a targeted cash transfer plan like PM-KISAN Rural distress has hit unprecedented levels. According to news reports, unemployment is the highest in 45 years. To allay some misgivings of the distress, one of the announcements in the Budget speech was that “vulnerable landholding farmer families, having cultivable land up to 2 hectares, will be provided direct income support at the rate of...