-The Indian Express Indian statistical system can withstand political pressures. Legislation and public scrutiny can strengthen it further. One unfortunate fallout of the recent controversy regarding the non-publication of the labour force survey report by the National Sample Survey Organisation has been the questions raised on the autonomy and independence of the Indian official statistical system. As reported in this newspaper, the possibility of junking the survey report in favour of...

-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 Telegraph Setting the record straight on the Narendra Modi establishment’s pervasive data-twisting Post truth. This seems to be the only surviving truth in today’s India, a country overrun with bare-faced lies, falsehood, deceit and invented truths — statistics. Note the brazen manner in which the chief of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, Bibek Debroy, declared recently that a new national sample survey will be conducted by the government to...

-The Indian Express NSSO employment report on 2017-18 was expected to reflect job losses Protesting against the withholding of the NSSO’s (National Sample Survey Organisation) first Annual Survey on Employment and Unemployment for the year 2017-18, the Acting Chairperson of the National Statistical Commission (NSC) resigned on Monday. Another colleague has also quit. This report, the first by NSSO in this government, was expected to reflect job losses in the wake of...

-TheWire.in P.C. Mohanan and J.V. Meenakshi – the only two non-government members of the commission – tendered their resignations because of the body's ineffectiveness. New Delhi: The only two non-government members of India’s National Statistical Commission have resigned, leaving just chief statistician Pravin Srivastava and NITI Aayog’s Amitabh Kant at the head of a body that is the apex advisory organisation for all of the country’s core statistical activities. According to sources with...