Rohini Somanathan
Rohini Somanathan is Professor of Economics at the Delhi School of Economics. Her research interests lie at the intersection of development economics, public economics and political economy. A major strand in her research explores mechanisms through which public institutions and community behavior influence patterns of mobility and group inequality. This includes work on the politics of caste identities in India and racial segregation in the United States.
Content by Rohini Somanathan
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Publication - Project Report
Food security and child malnutrition in India
6 Oct 2017 | Anders Kjelsrud, Rohini Somanathan
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Publication - Project Report
From clean fuel to clean air in India’s metropolitan cities
15 Aug 2017 | Parikshit Ghosh, Rohini Somanathan
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Project
The effects of food policy on cropping patterns and income distribution in rural Bihar
This project aims at understanding the combined effect of two state policies related to the production and distribution of food, namely the sharply rising minimum support prices (MSPs) offered to farmers to procure agricultural products and the subsidised distribution of food grains through the public distribution system (PDS). These are closely related in that high...
14 Oct 2016 | Rajnish Kumar, Rohini Somanathan
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Publication - Working Paper
The right to shelter: An evaluation of the land transfer programme to Mahadalits in Bihar
17 Jun 2016 | Hemanshu Kumar , Rohini Somanathan
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Multimedia Item - Video
Session 6 Part 2 (Coffey, Somanathan and Barooah) IGC-ISI Development Policy Conference 2014
29 Sep 2014
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Project
Food Security, Malnutrition and the Incidence of poverty in India
The Food Security Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha (the Lower House of the Indian parliament) in August 2013. The purpose of the legislation is to remove hunger and reduce malnutrition. The extent to which it will be able to do so depends largely on whether it results in higher food consumption. The Bill intends to provide 75% of the rural population and 50% of the urban...
4 Sep 2014 | Anders Kjelsrud, Rohini Somanathan
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Project
From clean-fuel to clean air in India’s metropolitan cities
Levels of ambient air pollution in many of the world's largest cities are alarming. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 90% of the population living in cities in 2014 was exposed to concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM 2.5) exceeding WHO air quality guidelines. Most Indian cities have noxious urban air quality for much of the year. Among the...
4 Sep 2014 | Rohini Somanathan, Parikshit Ghosh
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Publication - Working Paper
Regulating Vehicular Pollution in India
2 Sep 2014 | Rohini Somanathan, Parikshit Ghosh
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Project
The right to shelter: An evaluation of the land transfer programme to Mahadalits in Bihar
Bihar is unique among the Indian states in its commitment to provide landless families from historically disadvantaged groups a small amount of residential land for constructing their own homes. This is a key component of a much larger initiative that seeks to tackle persistent inequalities within the Scheduled Castes, a group of communities constitutionally identified for...
1 Nov 2013 | Rohini Somanathan, Hemanshu Kumar
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Publication - Policy Brief
Incorporating public good availability into the measurement of poverty (Policy Brief)
1 May 2013 | Anders Kjelsrud, Rohini Somanathan
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Publication - Working Paper
Incorporating public good availability into the measurement of poverty (Working Paper)
1 May 2013 | Anders Kjelsrud, Rohini Somanathan
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Publication - Working Paper
School meals and classroom effort: Evidence from India (Working Paper)
1 Feb 2013 | Farzana Afridi, Bidisha Barooah, Rohini Somanathan
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Project
A study to understand how availability of public goods in Bihar can be incorporated to improve poverty measures
Publicly provided goods and in-kind transfers vary substantially across Indian villages, yet they have never been explicitly incorporated in the official poverty measures. Since public provision influences household consumption decisions and levels, poverty numbers based solely on private consumption data are necessarily biased. This policy brief proposes a method for...
1 Jul 2012 | Rohini Somanathan, Anders Kjelsrud
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Project
Distributional Effects of Air Quality Legislation in India
Mandated fuel regulation for public vehicles has been a leading instrument used in many south Asian cities to reduce pollution and improve urban air quality. In India, the trend was set in 2001 when the Supreme Court ruled that all buses, taxis and auto-rickshaws in the capital New Delhi must run on compressed natural gas (CNG). Under the court’s directive, similar...
1 Jul 2012 | Rohini Somanathan, Parikshit Ghosh
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Project
Evaluating the effects of targeted transfers to 'Mahadalits' in Bihar
Affirmative Action policies have been at the centre of debates on social justice for many decades. In India, within the broader debate surrounding affirmative action for the Scheduled Castes, an especially contentious issue has been that of the sub-division of the Scheduled Castes into smaller groupings for targeted transfers. In 2007, the Government of Bihar identified a...
1 Jun 2012 | Hemanshu Kumar , Rohini Somanathan
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Publication - Working Paper
Regulating Vehicular Pollution in India (Working Paper)
25 Apr 2012 | Rohini Somanathan, Parikshit Ghosh
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Project
Improving Urban Air Quality in India: Lessons from the Kolkata Clean Air Regulations of 2009
Outdoor air pollution has been a major component of the Indian government’s environmental policy. Over the last decade several states have passed legislation that mandates the use of clean fuel in public transport vehicles and have expelled old vehicles from major metropolitan cities. In addition, federal norms have been brought in that control the emissions from newly...
1 Apr 2011 | Rohini Somanathan
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Project
Information provision and the quality of education in rural India
This study seeks to understand whether providing information on the absolute and relative quality of schooling to the stakeholders affects the behavior of service providers in both the public and the private sector. The quality of public services offered to the poor, especially in health and education, is dismal in most developing countries. An often cited reason for the...
1 Apr 2011 | Farzana Afridi, Rohini Somanathan, Bidisha Barooah