The National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) is an autonomous research institute under India's Ministry of Finance. Based in New Delhi, India, the centre conducts research on public finance and contributes to the process of policy-making relating to public finance. The NIPFP also works jointly with the Department of Economic Affairs at the Ministry of Finance to research the effects of past economic policy.NIPFP is overseen by a governing board comprising a chairman and representatives from the Ministry of Finance, Planning Commission of India and Reserve Bank of India. Urjit Patel is the present chairman and Pinaki Chakravarty is the present director of the institute. The previous director was Rathin Roy and chairman was Vijay Kelkar.
INTRODUCTION:Taxation of alcohol is an important policy instrument to combat the ill-effects of excessive alcohol consumption and raise revenues for governments. However, there is a need for studies exploring the demand price elasticity of different alcohols in Indian contexts amid changes in consumption habits, taxes and structure of the alcohol market. This paper examines the price and cross-price elasticity of demand for beer and foreign liquor in India using the latest surveys. METHODS:Household Consumption Expenditure Surveys of 2022-2023 to 2023-2024 is used to estimate the elasticity. Unit values based on Deaton's approach that leverages the geographic variation in unit values are utilised. Beer and foreign liquor were analysed jointly, with country liquor treated as a potential substitute. RESULTS:The price elasticity of beer and foreign liquor is found to be statistically significant and inelastic. Own-price elasticity is recorded to be around -0.27 and -0.25 in 2022-2023 and around -0.18 and -0.17 in 2023-2024. Income elasticity is positive and increased from 0.42 to 0.63 in 2022-2023 to 0.55-0.80 in 2023-2024. Significant cross-price effects between foreign liquor and country liquor exist in 2022-2023; however, they became weaker and largely insignificant in 2023-2024. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS:The above results show that the demand for alcoholic beverages in India is inelastic. Thus, the excise duties can be used by governments as instruments for increasing revenues and decreasing demand. The weakening of cross-price effects over time suggests reduced substitution between country liquor and higher-taxed alcoholic beverages.
Understanding the root causes of crime is essential to reducing it, and doing so effectively requires reliable data across multiple indicators—including negative income shocks, credit constraints and debt burden. This article uses data from the India Human Development Survey to examine how the 2010 Andhra Pradesh microfinance crisis affected crime and household debt in the state, employing a differences-in-differences framework. The findings reveal severe financial constraints and a sharp rise in debt burden driven by collapsing credit availability. Crucially, violent crime and conflict increased while non-violent crime declined, a pattern consistent with a cost–benefit trade-off at work, corroborated by both theoretical and historical empirical evidence. The key policy implication is that income shocks do not produce uniform effects across crime indicators; the nature of the crime shapes how its costs and benefits shift in response. Anticipating this heterogeneity is essential to containing the broader fallout of such crises. JEL Codes: G20, G21, G28
Public Financial Management (PFM) reforms are being increasingly recognized for their potential to enhance health financing systems and advance progress toward Universal Health Coverage (UHC). Although theoretical frameworks have outlined the pathways through which PFM reforms operate, empirical evidence on their effectiveness in specific low- and middle-income country (LMIC) contexts remains limited. This paper examines the reform of the Single Nodal Agency (SNA) system in India, aimed at improving budget execution in centrally funded schemes, including the flagship health sector scheme, the National Health Mission (NHM). The study analyzes the gains and challenges associated with the reform and highlights the institutional features that are critical to its effectiveness. The study draws on an assessment of SNA implementation in two Indian states, Bihar and Odisha, using qualitative evidence from key informant interviews conducted across multiple administrative levels between February 2023 and February 2024. This was supplemented with data provided by state finance departments and NHM implementing agencies. Results indicate that the reform has achieved its intended gains in cash management, expenditure transparency, and improved alignment of central fund releases with scheme expenditures at the sub-national level. However, weak budget credibility, coupled with constraints in digital connectivity and limited personnel capacity to manage financial transactions, is likely to exacerbate inequities in access to scheme funds. The increased emphasis on spending has heightened compliance pressures on fund utilization, while attention to actual health system outcomes remains limited. In sum, a conducive institutional environment is essential for reaping benefits through PFM reforms in LMICs.
In the wake of global climate change, this study tries to reconcile the competing evidence on the fiscal decentralization-environmental sustainability nexus by examining the impact of the regional authority index, a comprehensive index of decentralization, on ecological footprint-a novel and composite indicator of environmental sustainability. Using novel econometric techniques to account for potential asymmetry and endogeneity issues, such as the dynamic panel threshold methodology, and quantile techniques, on a sample of 53 countries over two decades, we find robust evidence that the effect is non-linear and conditional on the degree of fiscal decentralization. Decentralization exerts a favourable impact on ecological footprint in lower regime countries owing to positive externalities, while the adverse impact of the same is observed in higher regime countries due to the "race to the bottom" phenomenon. Furthermore, the mediating channels of political and financial globalization weaken the positive externalities spillover, whereas social and cultural globalization mitigates the "race to the bottom" effect, addressing the on-going debate about the trade-off between globalization and environmental sustainability. The effective mitigation of climate change impacts under sub-national governance is thus conditioned by an optimal mix of decentralization policies at the ground level, backed by global exchange of socio-cultural policies promoting ecological awareness.
In contrast to conventional output-based efficiency indexes that hold input-levels fixed, a graph index of efficiency-improvements (EIs) is derived for a by-production technology by optimizing a weighted average of EIs in input and good and bad-output directions. Under the by-production approach, EIs in the input directions are non-positively related to EI in the good-output direction and non-negatively related to EI in the bad-output direction. The optimal configurations of EIs balances between the gains for the graph efficiency index from increase in EI in the emission direction and the loss from reduction in EI along the good-output direction when there are EIs in the input directions. A comprehensive classification of possible optimal configurations of EIs is provided. The optimal configuration that materializes depends crucially on the weights given to EIs in the input and output directions. Even with zero weights given to EIs in all the input directions, the optimal configuration can involve EIs in the directions of the emission-causing inputs. The optimal configurations of graph EIs for the plants in the Indian coal-based thermal power sector are studied.
