-ThePrint.in In a statement issued on the second anniversary of demonetisation, former PM Manmohan Singh urged against ‘unorthodox, short-term economic measures’. Today marks the second anniversary of the ill-fated and ill-thought demonetisation exercise that the Narendra Modi government undertook in 2016. The havoc that it unleashed on the Indian economy and society is now evident to everyone. Notebandi impacted every single person, regardless of age, gender, religion, occupation or creed. It is often...

-The Hindu One student is making a drone, another a dancing robot. Scenes from two government schools in Delhi The walls of the entryway of the school are covered with bright charts that talk about everything from sustainable development and ‘Swachh Bharat’ to ‘happiness goals’ and exam schedules. The cream-coloured floor gleams and the sun peeps out from the clouds behind the rows of students — dupattas pinned, shirts tucked in, not...

-The Indian Express Claims that Aadhaar has increased the demand and allocations of NREGA work rest on several faulty assumptions. Two newspaper articles in the Times of India and Financial Express claimed that Aadhaar linking boosts MGNREGA and has cut wage payment delays. Both articles were based on a working paper, “A Friend Indeed”, by members of the Digital Identity Research Initiative (DIRI) at the Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad. The ISB...

-The New Indian Express In August, the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) released the All India Rural Financial Inclusion Survey, 2016-17 In August, the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) released the All India Rural Financial Inclusion Survey, 2016-17. It has revealing data about the worsening situation of farmers and villages across India. The survey shows that the average monthly income of rural households in India is...

-Networkideas.org In recent times, the clamour for formalising economic activity, or shrinking its unorganised component and expanding the organised, has been heard from diverse sources. There are those who want formalisation to occur because the unorganised sector is seen as being largely outside the direct and indirect tax net, depriving the government of much needed resources. Hence, for example, one feature seen as favouring the Goods and Services Tax regime is...