Ideas of India

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Mark Koyama and Jared Rubin about their new book, "How the World Became Rich: The Historical Origins of Economic Growth." They discuss the link between technological innovation and growth, the importance of global market competition, positive and negative effects of colonialism, the methodology of economic history and much more. Koyama is an associate professor of economics at George Mason University. He is interested in how historical institutions functioned and in the relationship between culture and economic performance. Rubin is a professor of economics at Chapman University. His research focuses on historical relationships between political and religious institutions and their role in economic development. Recorded July 27th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Mark on Twitter Follow Jared on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Jennifer Murtazashvili about the problems with imposing liberal democracy in Afghanistan, building state capacity, education, the role of the U.S. in the Ghani government's collapse and much more. Murtazashvili is the founding director of the Center for Governance and Markets and an associate professor at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Pittsburgh. Her research focuses on issues of self-governance, security, political economy and public-sector reform in the developing world. She is also a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is the author of "Informal Order and the State in Afghanistan" and the co-author (with Ilia Murtazashvili) of "Land, the State, and War: Property Institutions and Political Order in Afghanistan." Recorded July 20th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Jen on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Ashwini Deshpande about caste discrimination in labor markets, the reservation system and its critiques, education of women, how endogamy perpetuates caste, Bollywood films and much more. Deshpande is a professor of economics and the founding director of the Centre for Economic Data and Analysis at Ashoka University. Her Ph.D. and early publications have been on the international debt crisis of the 1980s. Subsequently, she has been working on the economics of discrimination and affirmative action, with a focus on caste and gender in India. She is the author of "The Grammar of Caste: Economic Discrimination in Contemporary India" and "Affirmative Action in India." Recorded July 7th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Ashwini on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Vinay Sitapati about Narasimha Rao's socialism, his working relationships with Manmohan Singh and others, how his skills as a translator were useful in his career, and much more. Sitapati is a political scientist, lawyer and journalist. He has a Ph.D. from Princeton University and degrees from Harvard University and the National Law School of India University, Bangalore. His first book, "Half-Lion," was a best-selling biography of P.V. Narasimha Rao. Sitapati teaches at Ashoka University, near Delhi. Recorded June 16th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Saumitra Jha about medieval ports, competition versus complementarity, marriage endogamy, the effect of military experience on the prevalence of violence and much more. Jha is a professor in the political economy group at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a senior fellow at the Center for Democracy, Development and Rule of Law in the Freeman-Spogli Institute for International Affairs. He also convenes the Conflict and Polarization Lab within the Stanford King Center on Global Development. His research focuses on understanding the effectiveness of organizations and innovations that societies have developed to address the problems of violence and political risk in the past and to develop new lessons for contemporary policy. Recorded on May 23rd, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Saumitra on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Lant Pritchett for a second time. They discuss internal and external migration, the concept of open borders, definitions of poverty, the flaws of randomized controlled trials and much more. Pritchett is a development economist from Idaho. He is currently affiliated with Oxford's Blavatnik School of Government as the research director of the RISE Programme, is the Research Director at LaMP (Labor Mobility Partnerships) and is a fellow at the London School of Economics. He previously worked with the World Bank from 1988 to 2007, living in Indonesia 1998-2000 and India 2004-2007. His publications span a wide range of development topics including economic growth, state capability, education, labor mobility and development assistance. Recorded April 27th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Adeel Hussain and Tripurdaman Singh about their book, "Nehru: The Debates That Defined India." They discuss homogeneity in parliamentary democracies, tensions between liberalism and cultural traditions, the branches of the Indian and Pakistani governments and much more. Hussain is an assistant professor at Leiden University and a senior research affiliate at the Max Planck Institute for International Law in Heidelberg. His research focuses on jurisprudence, comparative constitutional law, international law and the global history of legal and political thought, with a regional emphasis on South Asia and Europe. Singh is a British Academy postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London. His work explores the broad themes of sovereignty, state formation, decolonization and constitution making. Recorded May 13th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Adeel on Twitter Follow Tripurdaman on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

Take our listener survey here. In this episode, Shruti speaks with Naushad Forbes about his new book, "The Struggle and the Promise: Restoring India's Potential." They discuss why Indian companies spend so little on R&D, how companies learn and innovate, protectionism vs. open markets, higher education reforms and much more. Forbes is the co-chairman of Forbes Marshall, India's leading steam engineering and control instrumentation firm. He chairs the steam engineering companies within the group. He is also the chairman of Ananta Aspen Centre and was president of the Confederation of Indian Industry in 2016-17. Further, he is the chairman of the Centre for Technology, Innovation and Economic Research in Pune. Recorded April 30th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Naushad on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

Take the listener survey In this episode, Shruti speaks with Barkha Dutt about her new book, "To Hell and Back: Humans of COVID." They discuss the tragedies of the COVID-19 pandemic in India, the failures of the Indian state, the stories of Indian migrant workers, the decline of cable news and much more. Dutt is an Indian television journalist, author and owner of the YouTube news channel Mojo Story. She is an opinion columnist with The Hindustan Times and The Washington Post. Her previous book is "This Unquiet Land: Stories from India's Fault Lines." Recorded March 27th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Barkha on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

Take our listener survey here. In this episode, Shruti speaks with Anand Swamy and Tirthankar Roy about their new book, "Law and the Economy in a Young Democracy: India 1947 and Beyond." They discuss India's colonial legacy, forest laws, problems with eminent domain, the messiness of Indian legislation and much more. Swamy is the Willmott Family Third Century Professor of Economics at Williams College. His research interests are the economics of institutions and land, labor and credit markets in developing countries and South Asia. Roy is a professor at the London School of Economics, teaching South Asian and global history. His research focuses on Indian capitalism, specifically whether the country's history reveals patterns that can help understand how Indian capitalism works today. Recorded March 2nd, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Anand on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

Take our listener survey here. In this episode, Shruti speaks with Ramachandra Guha about his latest book, "Rebels Against the Raj." They discuss the influence of foreigners who renounced their native nationalities to become Indian, Gandhi's legacy, economic protectionism, constraints on free speech, cricket and much more. Guha is an Indian historian, environmentalist, writer and public intellectual whose research interests include social, political, contemporary, environmental and cricket history. For the academic year 2011–12, he held a visiting position at the London School of Economics He has also been a visiting professor at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. Recorded February 24th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Ramachandra on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox. Check out Macro Musings: https://www.mercatus.org/bridge/tags/macro-musings Follow Macro Musings on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Macro_Musings Subscribe to Macro Musings on your favorite podcast app.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Lant Pritchett about economic convergence, academic skepticism about growth, flawed methodologies in development economics, the shortcomings of India's educational system and much more. Pritchett is a development economist from Idaho. He is currently affiliated with Oxford's Blavatnik School of Government as the research director of the RISE Programme, is the Research Director at LaMP (Labor Mobility Partnerships) and is a fellow at the London School of Economics. He previously worked with the World Bank from 1988 to 2007, living in Indonesia 1998-2000 and India 2004-2007. His publications span a wide range of development topics including economic growth, state capability, education, labor mobility and development assistance. Recorded February 21st, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox. Check out Conversations with Tyler Subscribe to Conversations with Tyler on your favorite podcast app.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Rajesh Veeraraghavan about his book, "Patching Development: Information Politics and Social Change in India." They discuss the pros and cons of centralized welfare programs, why technology is not a cure-all, academia, Tamil comedy and much more. Veeraraghavan is an assistant professor of science, technology and international affairs at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. He has a Ph.D. in information systems from the University of California, Berkeley, and he worked as a software developer at Microsoft for nearly a decade. His research interests include developing digital technology-enabled interventions to address inequality and critically examining the role of algorithms and technology and its potential harms for marginalized people. Recorded February 11th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Rajesh on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox. Check out the 1991 Project here: https://the1991project.com Check out Macro Musings: https://www.mercatus.org/bridge/tags/macro-musings Follow Macro Musings on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Macro_Musings Subscribe to Macro Musings on your favorite podcast app.

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Rukmini about her book, "Whole Numbers and Half Truths: What Data Can and Cannot Tell Us About Modern India." They discuss Indians' multifaceted identities, endogamy, preference falsification and much more. Rukmini is a data journalist who writes columns for Mint, IndiaSpend and other publications. She has also written for HuffPost India, The Hindu and The Times of India. Additionally, she hosts a pandemic mini-podcast called The Moving Curve. Recorded January 24th, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox. Check out Conversations with Tyler Subscribe to Conversations with Tyler on your favorite podcast app.

In this episode, Shruti talks with Shrayana Bhattacharya about her book, "Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence." They discuss the symbolic resonance of Indian film star Shah Rukh Khan, women's changing social and economic status in India, the importance of supportive communities of women, Delhi as a city in transition, and much more. Bhattacharya is an economist in the World Bank's Social Protection and Labour Unit for South Asia. Her research interests include urban bureaucracy, social protection and informality. She completed her postgraduate education in public administration and economics from Harvard University. Recorded January 21st, 2022 Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox. Check out Macro Musings: https://www.mercatus.org/bridge/tags/macro-musings Follow Macro Musings on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Macro_Musings Subscribe to Macro Musings on your favorite podcast app.

In this episode, Shruti talks with Arvind Elangovan about his book, "Norms and Politics: Sir Benegal Narsing Rau in the Making of the Indian Constitution, 1935-50." They discuss the tensions surrounding the making of the Indian Constitution, the legacy of colonialism, the differing viewpoints of leaders such as Nehru and B.N. Rau and much more. Elangovan is an associate professor of history at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. His research interests include the political and constitutional history of South Asia, postcolonial India and the history of political and social thought. Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox. Check out Conversations with Tyler Subscribe to Conversations with Tyler on your favorite podcast app.

This episode is the twelfth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Radhika Jain about her job market paper, "Private Hospital Behavior Under Government Insurance: Evidence from Reimbursement Changes in India." They discuss the Bhamashah Health Insurance Program in Rajasthan, how hospitals are reimbursed for healthcare expenses, the effects of competition on the healthcare market and much more. Jain is the Asia Health Policy Postdoctoral Fellow for 2019-2022 at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University. Her research focuses on healthcare markets, the effectiveness of public health policy and gender disparities in health. Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Radhika on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

This episode is the 11th in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Apurav Yash Bhatiya about how voters behave in simultaneous versus sequential elections, possible reasons why they behave differently, politicians' use of the bully pulpit and much more. They discussed his paper titled "Behavioral Voters in a Decentralized Democracy" (coauthored with Vimal Balasubramaniam and Sabyasachi Das). Bhatiya is a Ph.D. student in economics at the University of Warwick. His research areas include political economy, development, and labor economics. Read a full transcript of this episode enhanced with helpful links. Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Apurav on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox.

This episode is the tenth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Dr. Archana Dang about her paper, "Role of Time Preferences in Explaining the Burden of Malnutrition: Evidence from Urban India." They discuss India's double burden of over- and undernutrition, why financial savings might be a good predictor of obesity, the effects of COVID on India's obesity levels and much more. Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of Economic Growth. Her research interests include the economics of health, specifically issues of overweight and obesity in India. Her work has been published in the journal Economics and Human Biology. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the ninth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Kim Fe Cramer about her job market paper, "Bank Presence and Health." They discuss how access to banking and credit benefits health, why those benefits happen, whether healthcare should be subsidized and much more. Cramer is a Ph.D. candidate in finance and economics at Columbia Business School. She researches how the financial sector affects development outcomes and has conducted experiments in countries including India, Kenya and Ecuador. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Kim on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the eighth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti and Karan Babbar talk about his job market paper, "COVID-19 and Period Products Usage Among Menstruating Women in Urban and Rural India." They discuss access to feminine hygiene products, effects of the pandemic on women's health, how reproductive knowledge is transmitted, and much more. Babbar is a Ph.D. scholar at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. His research interests include education, public health, gender and intersectionality. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Karan on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the seventh in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti speaks with Neha Gupta about her job market paper, "Homeownership, Renting and Market Failures: Evidence from Indian Slums." They discuss government policies to increase affordable housing, how nonstate actors affect slum and nonslum housing, the Swiss housing market and much more. Gupta has a Ph.D. in economics and finance from the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland. Her research interests include applied economics, causal econometrics, empirical macroeconomics, and urban and development economics. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Neha on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the sixth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Karmini Sharma about her job market paper, "Tackling Sexual Harassment: Experimental Evidence from India." They discuss how training about sexual harassment affects women's preferences and men's behavior, how long these effects are likely to persist, and the broader implications for the #MeToo movement in India. Sharma is a Ph.D. candidate in economics at the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on the intersection of economics of gender, development economics and experimental economics. She seeks to understand deterrence of sexual harassment, gender segregation and discrimination. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Karmini on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the fifth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Ashish Sedai about his job market paper, "Piped Water: Welfare and Empowerment: Empirical Evidence From a Gendered Analysis in India." They discuss the importance of indoor piped drinking water and its relevance to Indian women's participation in the labor force. Sedai is a Ph.D. candidate the Department of Economics at Colorado State University. His research focuses on how economic opportunities are generated and distributed in society, as well as the interplay between power and institutions and between economic behavior and the performance of the economy. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Ashish on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the fourth in a miniseries of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Bhumi Purohit about female leaders' access to networks, gender quotas, expanding women's access to social and political capital, and much more. Purohit is a Ph.D. candidate in political science at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research focuses on comparative politics, political behavior and South Asia; in particular, she seeks to understand the behavioral and institutional barriers to women's political representation. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Bhumi on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the third in a mini-series of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti speaks with Dr. Gaurav Mittal about illegal and informal methods of transit, the role of courts and bureaucrats in transportation policy, failed government schemes to solve the transportation crisis and much more. Mittal is an associate faculty member at the Singapore University of Social Sciences. He obtained his Ph.D. in geography from the National University of Singapore. His research interests include urban governance, public transport and political geography. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Gaurav on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the second in a mini-series of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti talks with Chhavi Tiwari about her job market paper titled "Internal Migration and Rural Inequalities in India" (with Sankalpa Bhattacherjee). They talk about the differences between seasonal and permanent migration in India, how economic factors influence migration patterns, why women with more children are less likely to work outside the home and much more. Tiwari is an assistant professor of economics at TAPMI, Manipal. She obtained her Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Management, Ranchi. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Chhavi on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the first in a mini-series of weekly short episodes featuring young scholars entering the academic job market who discuss their latest research. In this episode, Shruti speaks with Arkadev Ghosh about his job market paper titled, Religious Divisions and Production Technology: Experimental Evidence from India. They discuss the effects of inter-religion work groups on team productivity, how wider political tensions can affect the workplace and much more. Ghosh is a Ph.D. candidate in economics at the University of British Columbia. He obtained his master's in economics at the London School of Economics and his bachelor's degree at the University of Edinburgh. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Dr. Pratap Bhanu Mehta about Adam Smith's "The Theory of Moral Sentiments," spectatorship and imagination, self-interest, federalism, the Scottish Enlightenment as applied to Indian politics and much more. Mehta is the Laurence Rockefeller Professor for Distinguished Teaching at Princeton University. He is also a contributing editor and columnist at the Indian Express and former president and chief executive of the Center for Policy Research, New Delhi. He has written extensively on intellectual history, constitutional law and theory, political theory, India's social transformation and world affairs. He is the recipient of the Infosys Prize, the Adiseshiah Prize and the Amartya Sen Prize. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Pratap on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti talks with Alice Evans about fraternal capital, women's limited mobility, female friendships, representations of women in art and much more. Evans is a lecturer at King's College London and a faculty associate at the Center for International Development at Harvard's Kennedy School. She has published on topics such as women's labor force participation, urbanization and social change, pro-worker reforms, what drives support for gender equality and more. Her book "The Great Gender Divergence" is forthcoming from Princeton University Press. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Alice on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti talks with Uday Bhatia about Hindi gangster films, particularly "Satya" and its legacy. They discuss vigilante cops, corrupt politicians and other movie tropes, as well as how the Indian gangster film has evolved over time. Bhatia is a film critic with Mint Lounge. He has previously worked with Time Out Delhi and The Sunday Guardian. His writing has appeared in The Caravan, GQ, The Indian Quarterly, The Indian Express and The Hindu Business Line. Bhatia is also the author of "Bullets Over Bombay," a book about the iconic Indian film "Satya" and its legacy. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Uday on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

Ideas of India is a podcast in which Mercatus Senior Research Fellow Shruti Rajagopalan examines the academic ideas that can propel India forward. You can subscribe to the podcast on Apple, Spotify, Google, Overcast, Stitcher or the podcast app of your choice. In this episode, Shruti talks with Shreyas Narla and Prakhar Misra about India's 1991 economic reforms. They discuss the role of Prime Minister Rao and Finance Minister Manmohan Singh, India's transition from socialism to a market economy, the continued relevance of the 1991 reforms today and much more. Narla and Misra are research associates in the field of Indian political economy at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Shreyas on Twitter Follow Prakhar on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti talks with Salil Tripathi about Bangladesh's economic prosperity, cultural similarities and differences with India, religious and linguistic identity, and about what India can learn from Bangaladesh on its 50th anniversary. Tripathi is an Indian journalist, author and editor, currently the chair of PEN International's Writers in Prison Committee. and he is the Senior Advisor on Global Issues at the Institute for Human Rights and Business. He is the author of "Offence: The Hindu Case," "Detours: Songs of the Open Road" and "The Colonel Who Would Not Repent: The Bangladesh War and Its Unquiet Legacy." Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Salil on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Amartya Lahiri discuss the Indian economy in light of the country's socialist past, distrust of markets, current monetary policy and continuing challenges. Lahiri is a professor at the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia. He has previously held positions at the University of California Los Angeles and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. His current research interests include macro- and microeconomic developments in India over the past three decades. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Amartya on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Krish Ashok discuss different Indian cuisines, oral versus written tradition, the fusion of different musical styles, the challenges of working remotely and much more. Krish is the global head of digital workplace practice at Tata Consultancy Services in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. He is also a classical violinist, guitarist and cellist, and he has written a book, Masala Lab, on the science of Indian cooking. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Krish on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Yashica Dutt discuss India's caste system, being Dalit and "passing" as non-Dalit, the intersection of caste and gender, reservations in the Indian educational system and much more. Dutt is an Indian writer and journalist who has written on a broad range of topics including fashion, gender, identity, culture and caste. She has worked with the Hindustan Times, LiveMint, Scroll.in, The Wire and HuffPost India. Her new book, "Coming Out as Dalit," is a memoir of her experience as a Dalit woman and the history of the Dalit movement. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Yashica on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Keshav Desiraju discuss Indian musical traditions, devadasi women and the music of M. S. Subbulakshmi. Desiraju is the author of "Of Gifted Voice: The Life and Art of M. S. Subbulakshmi." He has recently retired from a career with the Indian Administrative Service and in 2013 was Secretary of Health & Family Welfare to the Government of India. He has held many positions with the Government of Uttarakhand, the Government of Uttar Pradesh and the Government of India. He continues to remain engaged with issues in public health, particularly mental illness, primary healthcare and community health, and he serves on the board of several nonprofit organizations. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Keshav on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Chinmay Tumbe discuss the history of pandemics in India and throughout the world, including cholera, influenza, plague and now COVID-19. They also discuss how issues of caste, migration and scientific progress have influenced these pandemics. Tumbe is an assistant professor of economics at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. His research interests include urban and labor economics, business and economic history, and migration studies. His most recent book is "The Age of Pandemics (1817-1920): How They Shaped India and the World." He is also the author of "India Moving: A History of Migration." Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Chinmay on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti talks with Alice Evans about issues affecting women in India, including single-gender education, son preference, social media and many others. Evans is a lecturer at King's College London and a faculty associate at the Center for International Development at Harvard's Kennedy School. She has published on topics such as women's labor force participation, urbanization and social change, pro-worker reforms, what drives support for gender equality and more. Her book "The Great Gender Divergence" is forthcoming from Princeton University Press. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Alice on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Virginia Postrel discuss her latest book, "The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World." They talk about different methods of dyeing, spinning as a feminine occupation, the textile trade in the 17th and 18th centuries, how technological changes disrupted the industry and much more. Postrel is an author, columnist and speaker whose work spans a broad range of topics from social science to fashion, concentrating on the intersection of culture, commerce and technology. Her previous books include "The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion" (2013), "The Substance of Style" (2003) and "The Future and Its Enemies" (1998). She is a regular columnist for Bloomberg Opinion and contributes columns, focusing primarily on history and material culture, to Reason. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Virginia on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti talks to Himanshu Jha about his recent book, Capturing Institutional Change: The Case of the Right to Information Act in India. Himanshu is a lecturer and research fellow in the Department of Political Science at the South Asia Institute at Heidelberg University in Germany. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Himanshu on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti speaks with Milan Vaishnav about a report, How Do Indian Americans View India?, in which he and his co-authors (Sumitra Badrinathan and Devesh Kapur) conducted a survey about the political beliefs of Indian Americans. They discuss the results of the survey and talk about how the Indian American community might change in the future. Vaishnav is the director and senior fellow of the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is also the author of When Crime Pays: Money and Muscle in Indian Politics (Yale University Press and HarperCollins India, 2017). His research focuses on Indian political economy, examining issues such as corruption and governance, state capacity, distributive politics and electoral behavior. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Milan on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti talks with Shoumitro Chatterjee about farms and farm policy in India, particularly in terms of government subsidies and other state intervention in agricultural markets. Chatterjee is an assistant professor of economics at Pennsylvania State University. His research interests include agriculture and international trade and development. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Shoumitro on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti and Chandra Bhan Prasad discuss the legacy of philosophy of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, the status of Dalits in India and the importance of entrepreneurship. Prasad is an Indian journalist, political commentator and activist, an entrepreneur and founder of the ByDalits.com platform, an adviser to the Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the editor of Dalit Enterprise Magazine. He is also a winner of the Emergent Ventures grant for his work on Dalit capitalism and progress. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Follow Chandra on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

In this episode, Shruti spoke with Arvind Panagariya about his book, Free Trade and Prosperity: How Openness Helps the Developing Countries Grow Richer and Combat Poverty. Panagariya is Professor of Economics and the Jagdish Bhagwati Professor of Indian Political Economy at Columbia University. From January 2015 to August 2017, he served as the first Vice Chairman of the NITI Aayog, Government of India in Prime Minister Modi's Cabinet. His primary research is international trade policy, economic development, and Indian political economy. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

This episode is the sixth and final installment of a series in which Shruti speaks with doctoral candidates and postdoctoral scholars about their research as they enter the job market and the world of academia. The first episode featured Vaishnavi Surendra, the second episode featured Rohit Ticku, the third episode featured Tanu Kumar, the fourth episode featured Proma Ray Chaudhury, and the fifth episode featured Vaidehi Tandel. In this episode, Shruti talks with Kunal Mangal about his research on the pursuit of government jobs in India and why the competition for these jobs is so fierce. Mangal is a Ph.D. candidate in public policy at Harvard University. His research focuses on labor markets in developing countries, and he is currently studying India's competitive exam system for government jobs. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

The fifth scholar in our young scholars series, Dr. Vaidehi Tandel. She is an economist specializing in urban political economy and policy in India. I spoke with Vaidehi about her work on urban economics in India, in particular, her paper on "What's in a definition? A study on the suitability of the current urban definition in India through its employment guarantee programme. (with Komal Hiranandani and Mudit Kapoor) and her paper titled paper, "Too slow for the urban march: Litigations and real estate in Mumbai, (with Sahil Gandhi, Alexander Tabarrok and Shamika Ravi) and her joint work on using a system of Adaptive Controls in the battle against Covid. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

The fourth scholar in our young scholars series is Proma Ray Chaudhury, a PhD Candidate at the School of Law and Government in Dublin City University under the EU Marie Curie ETN Global India Project, working on gender and women's political participation in contemporary India. I spoke with Proma about her paper titled, "The Political Asceticism of Mamata Banerjee: Female Populist Leadership in Contemporary India," where she studies representation of female political leaders, in particular, Mamata Bannerjee in West Bengal. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

For the next few weeks I will be speaking to young doctoral and post-doctoral candidates entering the academic job market and the policy world about their newly minted research on Indian political economy. The third scholar in our young scholars series, Dr. Tanu Kumar is a postdoctoral fellow at William and Mary's Global Research Institute. She is a political scientist studying urban politics and service delivery. I spoke with Tanu about her paper, "Home-Price Subsidies Increase Local-Level Political Participation in Urban India," which has been conditionally accepted at the Journal of Politics. In her paper, Tanu studies the effects of a housing subsidy program in Mumbai through an original survey of winners and nonwinners of program lotteries, and its effect on local political participation. We also discussed another one of Tanu's papers, "The Human Capital Effects of Subsidized Government-Constructed Homes in Urban India," on how this housing subsidy affects long-term investments in human capital. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!

For the next few weeks I will be speaking to young doctoral and post-doctoral candidates entering the academic job market and the policy world about their newly minted research on Indian political economy. The next scholar in our young scholar series is of Dr. Rohit Ticku. Rohit is a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute for the Study of Religion, Economics, and Society at Chapman University. He is working on religion, culture and identity from an economic point of view. I spoke with Rohit about his paper, titled Economic Shocks and Temple Desecrations in Medieval India, which is coauthored with Anand Shrivastava and Sriya Iyer, where they show that economic downturns led rules to strategically desecrate temples to quell mass uprisings. I also discussed another one of Rohit's papers titled Same Sex Marriage Laws and Coming out in America:Theory and Evidence from Catholic Priesthood (coauthored with Avner Seror) on the effect of the same-sex marriage laws on the expression of sexual identity in the United States. Full transcript of this episode Follow us on Twitter Follow Shruti on Twitter Click here for the latest Ideas of India episodes sent straight to your inbox!