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Public Service Delivery in India: Challenges and Opportunities

By Karthik Muralidharan
09.22.2007

After over a decade of rapid economic growth in India, the biggest challenge facing policymakers at both central and state levels is to ensure 'inclusive' growth so that the gains from increased national income are shared by all sections of society. In particular, it is imperative that a high quality of basic services such as health and education be provided to all citizens, since these are not only ends in themselves, but also play a critical role in enhancing individual capabilities to participate fully in the growth of the economy.

Deconstructing India's Software Success: The Human Capital Story

By Ashish Arora
06.07.2007

It is commonplace to call Bangalore India's Silicon Valley. Many Indians and non-Indians alike seem to be quite ready to believe that India's software success story is just a variant of American success. Even many thoughtful scholars, who recognize the significant differences between Bangalore and Santa Clara, nonetheless believe that because software activity in India is clustered, one must look to theories of industry clusters to understand what is going on. Instead, Indian software exports are clustered in states which graduated a large number of engineers in the mid 1980s, when software exports began. Furthermore, these states were able to graduate more engineers because they permitted private self-financed engineering colleges to operate.