The Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) — the largest food subsidy programme in India — has been a dismal failure in targeting the poor. The present paper examines its performance in three Indian states — Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan, based on primary data collected for...

In a developing economy with an ethnically diverse society, such as India's, household welfare and its distribution within the household unambiguously depend on how much time each member of the household spends on productive activity. In this paper we examine the welfare impact of reducing the...

This paper begins by highlighting some key characteristics of the demographic transition and child education and their relation to household poverty status in India as evidenced by our analysis of Census data (1951–2001) and those from NSS surveys in 1993–94 and 2004–05. Although total...

Governments struggle with the reality that the beneficiaries of anti-poverty programs are powerless to influence policies and stem the possibility of capture of benefits by the nonpoor. Networks – social and political – are supposed to increase the ability of the lesspowerful to access their...

Children ( under 15 years of age) growing up in poor and/or nutritionally deprived households also live with a number of layers of deprivations that stifle their freedom to actively participate in and benefit from elementary school education. Lack of health care, limited access to quality...

In India an important policy initiative has been the devolution of financial responsibilities to village level local governments called the Panchayats. The Preamble to this initiative is two fold. First such devolution would not only lead to increased public expenditure but also such...

Despite its evident importance relatively little is known about links between Body Mass Index (BMI) and participation in workfare programs, particularly in India. Using a unique data set for the Indian state of Rajasthan for 2009-10, this paper attempts to fill this void and examines the...

India's National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) has been hailed as one of the country's most creative social initiatives. Since the program was begun only recently (in 2004-05) there is a need to assess its impact on households not just in one year but over time. To the best of our...

In 1977 Sri Lanka was the first of the South Asian countries to decisively move away from the protectionist import-substitution trade policies that for many years had damaged their economic efficiency and hobbled their economic growth. Albeit with back-tracking episodes, Sri Lanka's liberalising...

Though the literature on federalism explains the economic gains from decentralised decision making and related issues in India, there are very few empirical studies examining the causal relationship between decentralisation and development outcomes. Much of the demonstrated gains are in the...