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Debraj Bhattacharya

The other India

Debraj Bhattacharya is an alumnus of Presidency College, Calcutta, and currently is with Institute of Social Sciences, a civil society organisation, where he researches on contemporary development issues. He has earlier edited a book of essays, "Of Matters Modern: The Experience of Modernity in Colonial and Post-Colonial South Asia" (2008) and has written several reports on rural development issues of India. He also writes in more popular vein in newspapers in English and Bengali.

Is NREGS significantly reducing poverty?

If you go to a district in India to see what kind of rural development work is going on there, you will see a gigantic government machinery from the Gram Panchayat level to the dis...
Debraj Bhattacharya - July 8, 2015, 9:57 pm explore: India
Has Delhi joined a global pink tide?

Since the victory of AAP in the Delhi Assembly election on February 11 there has been a series of analyses of why they have won both in the print and electronic media. The key deba...
Debraj Bhattacharya - February 12, 2015, 4:42 pm explore: India
India's Tryst with Entrepreneurship

Ever since India along with Brazil, China and Russia was declared by Goldman Sachs as the emerging giants of the world economy there has been a steady increase in publication of bo...
Debraj Bhattacharya - December 27, 2014, 11:18 pm explore: India
The Kiss of Globalisation: Is India Ready for It?

Consider the following facts from recent past: (a) Narendra Modi announces to the world a new slogan "Make in India", with the aim of transforming India into a manufacturing h...
Debraj Bhattacharya - November 15, 2014, 8:08 am explore: India
Kolkata: a tale of two rallies

The dream of "Paribartan" or change in West Bengal has turned into a nightmare at the end of three years and a bit of the TMC regime. Over the last three years, there have been man...
Debraj Bhattacharya - September 23, 2014, 10:59 pm explore: India
Human Development Index - a weapon of the weak?

If you are interested in 'development' you would probably know about the Human Development Index. Although the statistical calculation involved in arriving at the score for each co...
Debraj Bhattacharya - August 2, 2014, 12:50 pm explore: India
Modi's India: The first 30 days

Narendra Modi led NDA government has completed its first 30 days in office following a massive electoral victory in May. While it is too early to pass any judgment as to whether th...
Debraj Bhattacharya - June 26, 2014, 1:41 pm explore: India
Time to re-think MGNREGS

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Scheme is probably the most important rural development scheme of Government of India. Indeed if you go to a Panchayat office responsib...
Debraj Bhattacharya - May 5, 2014, 10:37 pm explore: India
Why voters are not as powerful as they are made out to be

Every time there is an election in India, especially a Parliamentary election, we see certain myths about the voter in India being propagated. Indian and foreign media harp on the...
Debraj Bhattacharya - April 4, 2014, 3:33 pm explore: India
Seven Rules of Populist Politics

You want to enter politics and transform your country? You want to be a popular politician? You want to be seen on television every evening? Here are seven golden rules that you ne...
Debraj Bhattacharya - February 7, 2014, 9:30 pm explore: India
Significance of the Polio Success

We love our stars. Whether it is Cinema, Cricket, Politics or Development we like to see stars on our television screen. As soon as a movement makes news the media starts focusing ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - January 22, 2014, 4:29 pm explore: India
An Open Letter to Shri Arvind Kejriwal, Hon'ble Chief Minister

An Open Letter to Shri Arvind Kejriwal, Hon'ble Chief Minister, New Delhi Dear Sir, As a humble "aam" blogger let me congratulate you on your remarkable success in the New Delhi A...
Debraj Bhattacharya - December 28, 2013, 4:22 pm explore: India
LGBT agitation and its paradoxes

First thing first - Article 377 should be amended/repealed to ensure that the LGBT community does not feel "criminalised". However in my view we need to think carefully why the Sup...
Debraj Bhattacharya - December 16, 2013, 8:51 pm explore: India
New Delhi Election: Where is the left?

New Delhi is going to the polls on December 4. I am writing this essay on November 30. The essay may or may not appear before the results are announced. But it does not matter. I a...
Debraj Bhattacharya - December 3, 2013, 1:06 pm explore: India
Arunachal Pradesh: Urban migration and rural development

It is by now a reality in India that there is a steady stream of people moving out from rural areas to cities in search of livelihood. It is also well-known that remittance from su...
Debraj Bhattacharya - October 25, 2013, 6:22 pm explore: India
Is Kerala losing form like Sachin Tendulkar?

It is well-known that Kerala is India's Sachin Tendulkar when comes to progress in Human Development. Over the last two decades it has made giant strides in human development and ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - September 30, 2013, 12:01 pm explore: India
Media and rape sensationalism

On the morning of 10 September 2013 I saw a wonderful piece of news on the net - the four accused in the rape case of a young girl in Delhi ("Nirbhaya") has been found guilty by th...
Debraj Bhattacharya - September 18, 2013, 9:09 am explore: India
End of Left Era in West Bengal Panchayats, but what next?

The war, camouflaged in liberal terms as an "election", is over and it is clear who has won it. The 2013 Panchayat Election in West Bengal has continued the trend that was set by t...
Debraj Bhattacharya - August 22, 2013, 2:24 pm explore: India
Why Jagdish Bhagwati is perhaps not correct

"I also believe that the Gujarat template is ideal: its people believe in accumulating wealth but they believe also in using it, not for self-indulgence but for social good. This c...
Debraj Bhattacharya - July 25, 2013, 7:00 pm explore: India
West Bengal panchayats: going down the drain?

The tug-of-war between the West Bengal government and the State Election Commission regarding deployment of security forces has now moved beyond the state and in the domain of the ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - July 2, 2013, 10:41 am explore: India
Food Security: an alternative model

Those who are following the fiasco in Parliament know that the Food Security Bill is proving to be very difficult to be debated, let alone passed. Every political party says that t...
Debraj Bhattacharya - May 20, 2013, 11:46 am explore: India
West Bengal: 'Presidency spirit' bounces back

"Debraj, I didn't believe that I would be able to walk this long in this heat" said Uttara Chakrabarty. Senior Citizen. Teacher in the History Department. Former student. Her face ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - April 11, 2013, 10:44 pm explore: India
Will the Food Security Act actually help the poor?

Frankly, I am nervous. I am not sure whether the Food Security Act is yet another overambitious programme of the Government of India or not. The idea, like many other previous 'inc...
Debraj Bhattacharya - April 1, 2013, 4:45 pm explore: India
Munna and some questions on child labour

Usually I do not like to bring in my personal experiences while writing. Let me make an exception here and tell you the story of a boy in our neighbourhood and raise some questions...
Debraj Bhattacharya - March 14, 2013, 1:59 pm explore: India
Re-thinking the foreign aid debate

The recent debate as to whether the United Kingdom should withdraw aid from India has generated strong emotions in both India and the UK (See end of this paragraph for the link). I...
Debraj Bhattacharya - February 25, 2013, 11:54 am explore: India
West Bengal: Poverty of the Intelligentsia

A Rajasthani colleague of mine once told me a joke about West Bengal. West Bengal is the state that has produced world famous economists but the state is economically poor whereas ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - February 18, 2013, 12:21 pm explore: India
Is the Right to Education resulting in rural children learning less in schools?

The Right to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, is considered a landmark in India's quest to provide every Indian child aged between 6 and 14 years with free education....
Debraj Bhattacharya - February 4, 2013, 2:14 pm explore: India
Is the Indian middle class becoming an active agent of change?

The recent outcry of middle-class men and women, many of whom not associated with any political party or developmental organisation, is an important phenomenon that deserves carefu...
Debraj Bhattacharya - January 17, 2013, 12:21 pm explore: India
Two cheers for the anti-rape movement

Following the horrific assault and rape of a 23-year-old girl in Delhi there has been massive protests at Delhi, in other cities of India as well on the social media. Print and ele...
Debraj Bhattacharya - January 1, 2013, 2:11 pm explore: India
20 years of the world's most ambitious experiment with democracy

The 22nd day of December this year marked the 20th anniversary of a particular amendment to the Indian Constitution. In very boring, dry language of the constitutional amendments i...
Debraj Bhattacharya - December 28, 2012, 2:33 pm explore: India
Decoding the development story of Gujarat

The debates surrounding Gujarat has in the last decade revolved perhaps a little too much around Narendra Modi. His followers have tried to portray him as India's best Chief Minist...
Debraj Bhattacharya - December 7, 2012, 3:37 pm explore: India
MGNREGS: Lofty idea, faulty implementation

Jairam Ramesh and the Ministry of Rural Development deserve to be congratulated for making the Annual Report for 2011-12 available in the public domain. It is available in the Mini...
Debraj Bhattacharya - November 27, 2012, 12:49 pm explore: India
The undeclared war among the states - where is this leading to?

On November 19, 2012, in a provocative article on Bal Thackeray, Markandey Katju has made an observation that deserves our close attention. Katju's article is on Bal Thackeray and ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - November 19, 2012, 4:54 pm explore: India
Is India an inefficient nation?

A few years back I was travelling from Lucknow to Kolkata by train. There was, as always, a shortage of tickets, and therefore for the first time in my life I bought a first class ...
Debraj Bhattacharya - November 14, 2012, 1:34 pm explore: India
Who speaks for the migrant worker in India?

Jagmohan Chaudhuri used to live in village Sandesh of Bhojpur District of Bihar. He was married to Bijanti Kunwar, and had five children. It was not possible for him to find enough...
Debraj Bhattacharya - October 30, 2012, 12:26 pm explore: India
West Bengal: The Long Road Ahead

In a little over a month from now, the West Bengal electorate will have the opportunity to choose a new set of legislators to guide the state’s fortunes for the next few years. A...
Debraj Bhattacharya - March 16, 2011, 3:04 pm explore: India

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