Modeling and Policy Impact Analysis

(MPIA) Network

Urban Informal Sector

and Poverty Effects of
Trade Reform in India
Saibal Kar
India

A paper presented during the 4th PEP Research Network General Meeting,
June 13-17, 2005, Colombo, Sri Lanka.

A Research Proposal submitted to Poverty and Economic Policy Network

Urban Informal Sector and Poverty

Effects of Trade Reform in India

Research Team
Prof. Sugata Marjit
Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, India
Dr. Saibal Kar*
Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, India
Ms. Rituparna Bhattacharya
Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, India

November 2004
Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, India
R-1 B.P. Township, Kolkata 700 094, India.
Telephone: +91-33-2462 5794/5795/7252
Fax: +91-33 2462 6183
URL: www.cssscal.org
* Corresponding Member.
E-Mail: saibal@cssscal.org

I.

Main Research Questions and Core Research Objectives

Purpose of the Research

1. Main Issue:

The basic issue we wish to address is how liberalization of trade

and investment, privatisation and dismantling of the public sector has affected the
present state of the informal sector in India and more importantly, what impact
have such changes lain on the incidence of income poverty in India. We also
provide a regional-level study on West Bengal, where the informal sector has
been largely responsible for recent growth in output and income.

II.

Scientific Contributions, Relevance and Knowledge Gaps

1.

Background, Motivation and Knowledge Gaps: As

in

other

developing

countries, an overwhelmingly large proportion (approximately 93%, and

excluding agriculture about 85%) of the workforce in India is employed in the
informal sector. A substantial portion of such employment opportunities is
generated in the urban or semi-urban areas and not surprisingly a majority of this
workforce is economically marginalized. High incidence of poverty among these
groups exposed to difficult and hazardous working conditions, non-existent social
security or health benefit schemes other than poorly functioning state-provided
medical facilities, and etc., is quite common. Sustained improvements in the
living standards of these groups can only be brought about by capital
accumulation, productivity gains and wage increases in this sector. Thus, a clear
understanding of the impact of economic liberalization on the informal sector is
of critical importance in developing pro-poor economic policies in India and
similar other low-income countries.
Many parts of South Asia, Latin America and Africa have experienced a process
of relative industrial decline in the last two decades. Liberalization and reduction
of state investment in public sector industries has contributed significantly to this
decline.

On the other hand, some of these countries have also experienced

agricultural growth, reduction in poverty, and, in some aspects, gender inequality.

2
Nonetheless, the size of the (non-agricultural) informal sector remains large.
Surprisingly, however, there has been no comprehensive investigation of
contemporary trends in this sector, other than disaggregated case studies. Thus,
analysis of the Indian evidence, and experience, promises to yield important
policy insights that can be generalized to other regional contexts.
2. Principal Objectives and A Brief Note on the Structure of the Indian
Economy:

Downsizing of the formal organized sector, as a consequence of

deregulation, tends to increase the size of the informal sector, where market forces
are much more active and labour laws lax or non-existent. There is considerable
evidence that deregulatory policies or a process of liberalization tends to increase
output as well as employment in the informal sector. There is also a general
apprehension, however, that this expansion is associated with a wage crash in the
informal sector.

This apprehension provides an impetus to criticisms of

deregulation and privatisation.

Recent studies have examined this issue in

sufficient detail (Marjit, Kar and Sarkar (2003), Marjit, Kar and Beladi (2003),
Marjit (2003), and Kar and Marjit (1999)). These studies show that contraction in
the formal sector may actually lead to both higher employment and wages in the
informal sector. This is likely if either capital is sufficiently mobile between
formal and informal sectors, or if a capital-intensive segment within the informal
sector contracts in response to deregulation. Marjit, Kar and Sarkar (2003) have
also provided evidence of substantial growth of wage rates in the informal sector
in most parts of India.1 Our principal research objective is to build on this work,
both theoretically and empirically, and extend the results to capture the
connection between developments in the informal sector and incidence of urban
poverty across various states in India, over the last two decades.
However, before we embark on the issue at hand, it might be instructive to
provide an outlook on the macroeconomic conditions prevailing in India at
present. In the process we also offer a brief account for the structure of external
exchanges, poverty indicators at the national and regional (state) levels, the
unemployment picture and some comments on the evolution of household
1

The full version of this paper is available under SGP conference at www.wider.unu.edu

3
income/consumption patterns.2
Indias macroeconomic condition in the post-liberalization era deserves special
attention. Certain emerging features of the economy seem to be quite positive,
although one has to admit that medium and long-run implications of these features
are yet to be fully understood. Since, it is beyond our scope to discuss all the
aspects of the current macroeconomic situation, we shall examine only the most
important ones.
Need for Reforms, Foreign Exchange Reserves and Related Issues:
Indias foreign exchange reserves have reached unprecedented heights during the
last few years as depicted in table 1. The present state of the foreign exchange
reserves in India is an outcome of a sustained period of impressive capital
account surpluses along with a sporadically impressive current account situation
(for the years 2001-02 and 2002-03). This signifies as a remarkable turnaround
within the span of a decade given the fact that in 1991 India had to prove her
creditworthiness by physically transferring gold to potential lenders.

In the

present context, a substantial foreign exchange reserves in India has reduced the
possibilities of sudden capital flights from the country and recurrent depreciation
of the rupee against dollar.

Moreover, this has substantially reduced the

possibility of currency depreciation following speculative attacks on the currency.

In short, among many positive implications of such changes, improvement in the
creditworthiness of the economy and higher inflow of foreign resources could be
viewed as some of the most important achievements.
Accumulations of reserves do have other macroeconomic implications as well. It
increases the liquidity of the economic system. Higher foreign exchange
reserves lead to an increase in the monetary base, i.e. the stock of high-powered
money. This is portrayed in table 2. As it can be seen here, the stock of
high-powered money has increased from $ 99505 million in the immediate preliberalization era to $ 416982 million (up to 26th March 2004) in the postliberalization period.

In this conection, we thank Nabil ANNABI, Bernard Decaluw and John Cockburn for providing very
useful comments on our initial proposal.

4
The real sector, on the other hand, has also received substantial growth impetus in
the post liberalization era. Further investigations are however necessary in order
to understand as to how much the growth in some of these sectors including the
IT, the automobiles etc. would have any positive impact on the deplorable poverty
situation that most parts of India is still afflicted with. At times, it might appear
that the post-liberalization euphoria and the corresponding expectations about the
market demand turned out to be far from reality. Other uncertain factors that also
have continued to affect investment decisions adversely include government
policies, bureaucratic hurdles, labor market related problems etc., each of which is
still in desperate need for further reforms.3 The following Tables (See Appendix
I) provide some inferences on the existing macroeconomic picture in India with
emphasis on the level of foreign exchange reserves, Balance of Payment statistics,
official currency exchange rates prevailing vis--vis other major currencies,
export performances etc.
In order to answer some of the above questions, Kar and Guha-Khasnobis (2004)
provide a brief compendium on the state of poverty reduction in India as reflected
in various measures carried out during the post-reform decade in India. The
purpose of this study has been two-fold. First, it provides a brief survey of the
existing evidence on the subject of poverty and income inequality in the postreform India. Second, the pervasiveness of economic restructuring with trade
reforms as the most visible of its instruments strongly pushed a related study. In
fact, the causality between trade openness in India and the measures of poverty
seemed relatively under-explored.

Although the findings in this regard are

exploratory in nature, important policy implications follow.

Studies on poverty in India categorically speak of various measures of poverty, of
economic growth and poverty connections, of redistribution and poverty, of
poverty and inequality and more recently as this particular study focuses on of
economic reforms and poverty.
There is little doubt that the economic reforms since early 1990s had significant
3

See for example, Bardhan, Pranab (2002), The politics of economic reform in India,
http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/macarthur/inequality/papers/BardhanReformIndia.pdf.

5
impacts on the income and poverty levels in both rural and urban India. A
number of recent empirical studies show that the percentage of poverty has
declined both at the all-India and at the regional (States / UTs) levels.4 The
causes underlying such changes are diverse.

Not surprisingly, the evolving

relationships between poverty and inequality too have numerous interpretations,

of which a notable contribution is available in Dreze and Sen (2002).
Using an international poverty line of around $1 per day at 1993 Purchasing
Power Parity, it is estimated that about one third of the poor in the mid-1990s
lived in India (Datt and Ravallion, 2002a).

Therefore, what happens to the

incidence of absolute poverty in India is quantitatively important to the worlds

overall progress in fighting absolute poverty.

In India, the decadal average

growth rates for 1960s and 70s were around 3.4%, implying per capita growth
rates of about 1%. The growth rates in national output since the mid-1980s, and in
particular since 1993 have been appreciably higher on average than in the 1960s
and 70s. The growth rate in net national product per capita was 4.8% per annum
between 1993/94 and 1999/00. It is widely believed that the reforms of the 1990s
were instrumental in achieving higher growth. However, it is not clear how much
Indias poor have shared in those gains.
Before focusing on the 1990s and to the connection between economic reforms
and poverty, we take a quick glance on the broader trends of growth rates and the
incidence of poverty between 1960-2000, as presented in Datt and Ravallion
(2002a, Table 1). They show that the poverty level has gone down considerably
although the stagnation in the rural poverty level has in fact increased the ruralurban poverty ratio during these years.
In fact, the general picture in the 1990s is quite contentious. This stands firmly in
contrast to the broader consensus prevailing in the 1980s that poverty rates had
fallen appreciably during the decade.

Generally speaking, two visibly polar

notions about the impact of reform on poverty dominate the literature, although
there are also some studies that do not find clear evidence on the influence of
economic reforms on poverty. One group strongly claims that poverty reduction
4

For example, Datt (1999), Datt and Ravallion (2002 a), Sundaram and Tendulkar (2003 a, b, c) etc. .

6
in India in the decade of the 1990s have been summarily dismal. These studies
include those by Ninan (1994, 2000), Dev (1995), Tendulkar and Jain (1995),
Tendulkar and Jain (1995) and others.. Notably, Ninan (2000) provides a reestimate (following an initial estimate in 1994) of rural, urban and national level
poverty trends in India. It is claimed that, while rural, urban and overall national
poverty levels in India recorded a significant decline during the pre-reform
periods (1969-70 to 1990-91), during the post-reform period (1991-92 to 199394), these negative trends have weakened or got reversed in terms of one or more
poverty indicators namely, Head Count Ratio (henceforth, HCR), Poverty Gap
Index (henceforth, PGI) or Squared Poverty Gap Index (henceforth, SPGI).
Furthermore, majority of the fifteen larger states in India that contributed
positively towards overall poverty reduction in the pre-reform decades reported
statistically insignificant poverty reduction rates in the post-reform period
Punjab and Haryana even reporting an actual increase in rural poverty.
A few other contemporary studies (Dev, 1995; Gupta, 1995; Tendulkar and Jain,
1995 and others), which might have been somewhat pre-mature in assessing the
role of economic reforms on poverty, also note increases in both rural and urban
poverty rates. Dev (1995) report an increase in poverty rates during the first 18
months, after economic reforms were initiated in India. Tendulkar and Jain
(1995), for example, claim a sharp increase in rural poverty rates with a moderate
rise in urban poverty rates during 1991-95, although the reforms were only
indirectly responsible for such a trend. Gupta (1995) believes that the losses
incurred due to the emancipation of the traditional Indian economy has been
moderate compared to the experiences of other developing countries, but the
social costs of such reforms were large enough to demand a corrective course.
Later studies readdress the issue of effect of economic reform on poverty and find
that in the second half of the 1990s rate of poverty reduction was significant,
especially in the urban areas. Datt (1999), for example, show that overall poverty
reduction has been moderate despite significant reductions in urban poverty,
mainly due to the stagnation in rural poverty rates. Datt & Ravallion (2002a,b)
make more general observations that states with higher literacy, higher farm

7
productivity, higher rural living standards, lower landlessness, and lower infant
mortality (2002 a, pp. 381) have gained relatively more from the pro-poor nonfarm economic growth in India, compared to states without these attributes. Datt,
Kozel and Ravallion (2003), further show estimates towards decline in poverty
rates between 1994-2000 from 39% to 34%. Sundaram and Tendulkar (2003b)
provide a re-estimate of their earlier study (2003a) to observe that a clear and
unambiguous decline in poverty between 1993-94 and 1999-00 tends to hold
good, although the magnitude gets dampened by 7 to 10 percentage points,
depending on the indicator and the population segment considered. Nonetheless,
there is a stronger claim that the average annual reduction in poverty In India
during the later half of the 1990s had been higher than that recorded during the
ten-and-a-half years prior to 1993-94. However, within rural and urban areas,
there could still be high incidences of poverty depending on the social groups
under consideration.

Sundaram and Tendlkar (2003c) report that during the

decade of 1990s scheduled castes, agricultural labor (rural) and casual labor
(urban) experienced declining trends in income poverty although, scheduled tribe
households continued to suffer.
A few other studies, notably by Deaton and Dreze (2002) find no support for
sweeping claims that the nineties have been a period of unprecedented
improvement or widespread impoverishment.

Nonetheless, they draw a

number of lessons from their reexamination of the evidence on poverty and

inequality in the nineties. First, they find consistent evidence of continuing
poverty decline in the nineties, in terms of the headcount ratio. In view of the
methodological changes that took place between the 50th and 55th Rounds of the
National Sample Survey, they discussed alternative estimates, based on
comparable data from the two surveys and concluded that that a large part of the
poverty decline associated with official figures is real, rather than driven by
methodological changes. They argued for wider adoption of alternative poverty
indexes such as the poverty-gap index and find that this refinement does not, after
all, make much difference in this particular context5.
5

See tables, 2a, 2b and 5 and figure 1 in Deaton and Dreze (2002).

8
The other part of the study by Kar and Guha-Khasnobis provides some simple
connection between the Trade Openness Index and the Coefficient of Variation in
all India poverty levels between 1973-74 and 1999-00 (tables 8 and 9 and figure 1
in Appendix I provides the data and results). The correlation coefficient between
TOI and COV at the all-India level is obtained as 0.85, significant at 10% level.
Furthermore, the study uses national level estimates of HCR for rural (R) and
urban (U) areas and calculates the degree of correlation between these measures
and the extent of trade openness in the country. Not surprisingly, the correlation
coefficient between TOI and HCR (U) is stronger (-0.79) than that between TOI
and HCR (R) at -0.40.
For the present proposal we intend to use some of these results in order to find a
direct connection between trade reforms, the state of the informal economy and
the poverty rates in India. The state of unemployment level in India is also
provided in the appendix (Table 10).
3.

Key Hypotheses:

Our theoretical starting point is the observation that capital

stock in the formal sector has an incentive to move to the informal sector in
response to deregulation in the formal sector. In the absence of major constraints
on such movements, this effect will contradict the negative impact, on informal
sector wage rates, of greater employment in the informal sector typically the
consequence of labour-shedding in the formal sector. Once the trends in informal
wage is appropriately documented, we explore the poverty reducing effects of
such wage / income consequences. However, it is as well to provide some
information here on what Marjit and Kar (2004) found regarding the state of
informal wage in India between 1984-85 and 2000-01. Although, this study does
not explicitly relates to the poverty questions that forms the prime motivation
behind this proposal, it has been shown that the urban informal real wage has
increased substantially for workers hired under Non-Directory Manufacturing
enterprises in India. Table 11 in the appendix provides annual wage growths
between 1984-85 and 2000-01, along with a post-reform average.

9
We intend to seek the relationship between such informal wage movements and
the poverty trends in India. The way we intend to deal with this project, an
exploration into such relationship will only serve as a starting point in this project.
Our main intention is to undertake a primary survey of both urban and rural
informal sectors in the state of West Bengal, which reported (West Bengal
Human Development Index) a phenomenal increase in the informal employment
and wages over the last few years. The primary survey should be designed to
account for the state of poverty in households where one or more persons work in
the informal sector. We will offer a detailed discussion on the survey mode
subsequently.
Besides, the trend in urban poverty in particular is expected to lend further insight
into its effects on rural incidence of poverty (over and above the direct
connections between rural informal activities and rural poverty) via channels of
rural-urban migration, which remains a predominant feature of the labor markets
in India.
The theoretical methodology incorporates a general equilibrium structure,
although we want to emphasize that the designed empirical study shall not be a
computable general equilibrium exercise, simply because it will clutter our results
(with too many variables used and too many cross-relationships in operation) and
shift away the focus away from the hypothesized relationship between informal
income and income poverty. Nonetheless, a copy of our theoretical results is
provided herewith for exemplifying our desired line of action. (See Uploaded
Attachment).

It should also be mentioned that the available data on the

unorganized sector in India does provide fairly disaggregated account (across

gender, skill or occupation types, age groups including child labor etc), which
shall adequately be made use of. Nevertheless, there is need for caution involved
in connecting such data set with the poverty picture, not only because they are
compiled by different organizations with different sampling and estimation
methods in use, but also because the periods of these surveys mostly do not
match. Thus, we believe that our primary survey shall help correct some of the
time inconsistencies present in the available data sources and also help cross-

10
checking the relationships (at lest for West Bengal) that have emerged from the
use of available secondary data.
4. Contributions of the Project:

Theoretical and empirical investigation of

the hypotheses we have outlined above would allow one to develop a better
understanding of (a) the implications of deregulation for the well-being of the
poor, and (b) the nature of the structural constraints on inter-sectoral capital
mobility that restrict the actualisation of potential gains in terms of poverty
alleviation. While the insights gained would be open to generalization to most
developing countries, the empirical analysis would allow formulation of detailed
policy prescriptions relevant to India.

III.

Policy Relevance
Direct-Indirect Impacts on Poverty and Target Groups:

The importance of

our research agenda is attested to by the existence of a number of studies of trends

in the informal sector, both in India and elsewhere.6 Most of these studies are
however localized and gender or commodity specific. Furthermore, these studies,
by and large, are not theoretically grounded in a rigorous general equilibrium
framework and the issue of informal sector income and poverty in India is
seemingly unexplored.

With the help of a comprehensive and theoretically

grounded investigation of the sort proposed here, we intend to bridge an existing

gap in the literature, both theoretically and empirically. The research findings
should be of considerable interest to an audience comprising federal and state
governments, policy makers both in the government and in the private financial
institutions, aid agencies and NGOs, and doubtless, of professional economists.

IV.

Methodology
While the theoretical motivation of the proposed research has been briefly
outlined above, we will further explore other angles that involve important issues

See Vishwanathan et al. (2003); Pais (2002), Unni (2001), Mitra (1998), Zagha (1998), Mahadevia
(1996), among others for trends in informal employment and output in India and other South East Asian
countries. Also See Alleyne (2001) for Jamaica; Brand et al. (1993) for Zimbabwe; Tripp (1997) for
Tanzania; Musyoki and Orodho (1993) for Kenya; Saavedra and Chong (1999) for Peru; Funkhouser
(1994) for Central America etc. The literature also provides an elegant study by Goldberg and Pavcnik
(2003) relating informal sector and trade reform for Brazil and Columbia.

11
like tolerance of informal sector as a political substitute for non-existent social
security benefits in India and many other developing countries. The primary
phase of the project will be devoted to collection and processing of the data and
material available from secondary sources, such as from NSSO (National Sample
Survey Organization, Department of Statistics, Government of India). The study
by Marjit, Kar and Sarkar (2003) uses periodic (1984-85, 1989-90, 1994-99,
1999-00 and 200-01) data on informal manufacturing in India published by
various rounds of NSS. The subsequent data on incidence of poverty, measured
by using Head Count Ratio, Poverty Gap Index or Squared Poverty Gap Index,
also need to be collected from Consumer Expenditure surveys of NSS and from
the all-India survey of unorganized manufacturing sectors. In this regard, our
proposed research agenda must also take into account the already much debated
relationship between economic reform and its effect on the extent of income
poverty in India.7 For purpose of empirical investigation, we identify our target
variable to be the magnitude of income poverty in India and the main explanatory
variable as the informal wage, which again is dependent on the magnitudes of
external shocks, such as trade liberalization, and the degree of capital mobility
between formal and informal sectors. Therefore, our proposed study would
provide a clear causal relation between economic reform and urban poverty by
identifying the role of urban informal sector as a possible catalyst.
In a nutshell, the tentative methodology involves an account of the effect of
economic reforms on the level of informal activity in India, and in particular the
regions of West Bengal. Our final intention is to relate such developments in the
informal sector to the general poverty picture and in a sense account for the
impact of reforms on poverty. The empirical model, very tentatively presented
below should take the form:
W jt = 1 + T Tkt + u1t

On the one hand, a group of studies claim that the rate of poverty reduction in the decade of the 1990s has
been summarily dismal see for example, Ninan (1994, 2000), Dev (1995), Tendulkar and Jain (1995),
Tendulkar and Jain (1995), Sundaram and Tendulkar (2003a) etc. On the other hand, later studies by Datt
(1999), Datt & Ravallion (2002a,b), Datt, Kozel and Ravallion (2003), Sundaram and Tendulkar (2003b),
etc. report declining trends in poverty, mainly that in urban poverty rates.

12
and

Pjt = 2 + R R jt + M W jt + Tit + u2t

(1)

where, W = Real Wage/Income of labor, R = Direct anti-policies by the government, T =

Trade reform, i.e. lowering of import duty in kth sector and P = Level of Poverty
(HCR or PGI); k= sector type; j = States / UTs in India, t= time in years.

V.

Data Sources and Distribution of Work

1. While data requirement and available sources have already been mentioned in the
last section, there is need to obtain a continuous time series data set from this
source so as to cover a time span of two decades since 1980s. Thus, the second
part of our study should focus exclusively on collection and interpretation of
relevant data in line with the issues raised here. Our aim is to collect information
on the state of employment, wages and consumption levels of informal workers
across various locations in India from available secondary sources and undertake
a primary survey in West Bengal. The standard statistical and econometric tools
involving sampling methods, multi-stage regression analysis, ANOVA, use of
instrumental variables etc. will be deployed for carrying out our proposed
empirical investigations.
2. Thus, our primary focus remains on deriving generalised results that could be
used to address poverty alleviation objectives for a much greater audience, given
that the structure and the anatomy of the developing countries across the world
are significantly similar.
3. Distribution of the work between the members is planned as follows: the lead
researcher shall be responsible for outlining the theoretical and empirical
constructs of the proposed study over and above a continued monitoring of the
progress; the other member (Dr. Saibal Kar) shall be in charge of executing the
main analyses of the empirical observations for the study with due assistance from
Ms. Rituparna Bhattacharya, who will be in charge of the primary data collection.

13

VI.

Dissemination Plan and Tangible Output

Dissemination:

We plan to hold a national level workshop to share our

findings with policy-makers, influential academics, politicians, labor leaders etc.,

and communicate extensively the main findings of our project to policy-makers
dealing with social and legal institutions and with poverty eradication policies. It
would be easy to conduct a program of this nature, as all members of the team are
well connected to the academic staff at various universities and research institutes
with vast experience in training and in addressing similar research questions.
The end users of the study would be:
1. The state and central governments in India, especially those within it concerned
with policy making in the ministries for industry, agriculture and labor;
2. Politicians and political parties;
3. Financial institutions including nationalized and private sector banks such that
better opportunities for development financing could be opened up for informal
entrepreneurs and workers and in the process bringing them in the mainstream
economic activity;
4. Opinion leaders, NGOs and other social activists, labor unions etc.

Besides formal publication of individual studies in the form of academic articles,

the study along with the proceedings of the Conference may be published as a
book, under suitable guidance and permission from PEP. This is certainly a
possibility, given that the principal researcher has widely published his work with
the major publication houses such as Oxford University Press, Academic Press,
Springer-Verlag etc.

Salient features of the study would be provided as public knowledge in the form
of WWW listing, and detailed papers should be made downloadable.

Tangible Outputs:

A set of papers to be published in refereed academic

journals, in popular media to catch public attention, a book as a collection of such

papers/ a national level workshop / counseling to parties interested in dealing with
post-reform informal sector and poverty alleviation scenario in the developing
world.

14

VII. References
Alleyne, Dillon (2001): The dynamics of growth, employment and economic
reforms in Jamaica; Social and Economic Studies, 50, 1, 55-125.
Bardhan, Pranab (2002), The politics of economic reform in India,
http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/macarthur/inequality/papers/BardhanReformIndia.pdf.
Datt, Gaurav (1999), Has poverty declined since economic reforms? Statistical
data analysis, Economic and Political Weekly, December 11.
Datt, Gaurav and Ravallion, Martin (2002a), Why has economic growth been
more pro-poor in some states of India than others? Journal of Development
Economics, 68, 381-400.
Datt, Gaurav and Ravallion, Martin (2002b), Is Indias economic growth
leaving the poor behind? Journal of Economic Perspectives, 16, 3, summer 2002,
89-108.
Datt, Gaurav, Kozel, Valerie and Ravallion, Martin (2003) A model-based
assessment of Indias progress in reducing poverty in the 1990s, Economic and
Political Weekly, Jan 25.
Deaton, Angus and Dreze, Jean (2002), Poverty and inequality in India: A
reexamination, Economic and Political Weekly, September 7.
Dev, S Mahendra (1995), Economic reforms and the rural poor, Economic and
PoliticalWeekly, 19 August.
Dreze, J and Sen, Amratya (2002), India Development and Participation,
Oxford, New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Brand, V. et al. (1993): Women informal sector workers and structural
adjustments in Zimbabwe, In Social Change and Economic Reform in Africa;
Uppsala: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies.
Funkhouser, Edward (1994): The urban informal sector in Central America:
Household Survey Evidence; University of California, Santa Barbara Working
Papers in Economics: 23-94.
Goldberg, Pinelopi and Nina Pavcnik (2003): The response of the informal
sector to trade liberalization; NBER Working Paper # 9443.
Gupta, S. P. (1995), Economic reforms and its impact on the poor, Economic and
Political Weekly, June 3.
Kar, Saibal & S. Marjit (2001): Informal sector in general equilibrium: welfare
effects of trade policy reforms; International Review of Economics and Finance,
10, 289-300.
Kar, Saibal and B. Guha-Khasnobis (2004), Trade openness, poverty and food
security in India; unpublished manuscript, UNU-WIDER.
Lal, Deepak, Natarajan, I and Mohan, Rakesh (2002), Economic reforms and
poverty alleviation: India A tale of two surveys, UCLA Dept. of Economics
Working Paper # 822 (2002).
Mahadevia, Darshini (1996): Informalization of employment and incidence of
poverty in Ahmedabad; Indian Journal of Labour Economics, 41, 3, 515-30.
Marjit, Sugata (2003): Economic reform and informal wage- A general
equilibrium analysis, Journal of Development Economics, 72, 371-378

15
Marjit, S., S. Kar and H. Beladi (2003): Trade reform and informal sector;
mimeo, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta.
Marjit, S., Saibal. Kar, and P. Sarkar (2003): Trade Reform, internal capital
mobility and informal wage Theory and evidence, mimeo, Centre for studies in
Social Sciences, Calcutta, India. Full text available under SGP conference at
WIDER, Helsinki. Website: www.wider.unu.edu
Mitra, Arup (1998): Employment in the informal sector; Indian Journal of
Labour Economics, 41,3.
Musyoki, A. & J. Orodho (1993): Urban women workers in the informal sector
and economic change in Kenya in the 1980s, In Social change and economic
reform in Africa, 106-33, Uppsala: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies.
Ninan, K. N. (1994), Poverty and income distribution in India, Economic and
Political Weekly, June 18.
Ninan, K. N. (2000), Economic reforms in India: Impact on the poor and poverty
reduction, Sussex: IDS Working Paper # 102.
NSSO, 1989 (40th Round), 1993 (45th Round), 1996 (51st Round), 1999 (55th
Round), Survey of unorganized manufacture, Department of Statistics,
Government of India.
Pais, Jesim (2002): Casualisation of urban labour force Analysis of recent
trends in manufacturing; Economic and Political Weekly, Feb 16, Special Article.
Saavedra, J. & Alberto Chong (1999): Structural reform, institutions and
earnings: evidence from the formal and informal sectors in Urban Peru; Journal of
Development Studies, 35, 4, 95-116.
Sundaram, K and Tendulkar, S (2003a), Poverty has declined in the 1990s: A
resolution of comparability problems in NSS Consumer Expenditure, Economic
and Political weekly, Jan 4.
Sundaram, K and Tendulkar, S (2003b), Poverty in India in the 1990s
Revised results for all-India and 15 major states for 1993-94, Economic and
Political Weekly, Nov 15.
Sundaram, K and Tendulkar, S (2003c), Poverty among social and economic
groups in India in 1990s, Economic and Political Weekly, Dec 13.
Tendulkar, S and L. Jain (1995), Economic reforms and poverty, Economic and
Political Weekly, June 10.
Tripp, A. M. (1997): Changing the rules: the politics of liberalization and the
urban informal economy in Tanzania; Berkeley and London: University of
California Press.
Unni, Jeemol (2001): Gender and informality in labour market in South Asia;
Economic and Political Weekly, June 30, Special Article.
Vishwanathan, P. K et al. (2003): Informal labour market and structural
devolution; Economic and Political Weekly, August 2.
Zagha, Robert (1998): Labor and Indias economic reforms; Journal of Policy
Reform, 2,4, 403-26.

16

VIII. Prior Training and Expertise

Please consult short CVs attached herewith for prior training and expertise of the
researchers in issues and projects of this nature.

IX.

Capacity Building
The Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta is a multi-disciplinary institute

with substantial research work done in the fields of economics, sociology, political
science, law and governance, gender and cultural studies. A project of this nature with
building up of a database and analyses on informal sector and poverty can be of sufficient
importance and use to researchers in other fields and for students alike. Besides, research
and teaching in this institute reaches a very wide audience including students, teachers,
government departments, NGOs, etc., not only in the province of West Bengal, but in
India as well. We also offer a one-year Research Training Program to participants from
all over India and to international students mainly from Africa and Asia, where
techniques used in practical research questions of this sort and results thereof, can be
easily disseminated much to their interest and benefit. Extent and reach of this program
along with interests and contributions of the faculty can be obtained from our website:
www.cssscal.org

X.

Ethical, Social, Gender, Environmental Issues or Risks

None that we are aware of.

XI.

Appendix I

XII. List of Projects Undertaken and Brief CVs of Members of the

Research Team

17
Appendix I
TABLE: 1
Foreign Exchange Reserves
$ US million.

PRE LIBERALIZATION ERA POST LIBERALIZATION ERA

YEAR

LEVEL

GROWTH (%)

6823
4390
4896
5649
5952
6520
6574
6223
4802
3962
5834
9220

(-) 7.31
(-) 35.65
11.53
15.38
5.36
9.54
0.828
(-) 5.34
(-) 22.83
(-) 17.49
47.25
58.04

YEAR

LEVEL

GROWTH
(%)

1992-93
9832
6.64
1993-94
19254
95.83
1994-95
25186
30.81
1995-96
21687
(-) 13.89
1996-97
26423
21.84
1997-98
29367
11.14
1998-99
32490
10.63
1999-00
38036
17.07
2000-01
42281
11.16
2001-02
54106
27.97
2002-03
75428
36.79
2003-04
74805
(-) 0.826
2004
110317*
47.47
Source: Handbook of statistics on Indian Economy, Reserve Bank of India and different publications
of Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCI &S).
Note: * stock of reserves up to 26th March 2004.
1980 - 81
1981-82
1982-83
1983-84
1984-85
1985-86
1986-87
1987-88
1988-89
1989-90
1990-91
1991-92

TABLE: 2
Monetary Base (Reserve Money, Rs crores (0.1 bn))
PRE-LIBERALIZATION ERA.
YEAR
1980-81
198182
1982-83
1983-84
1984-85
1985-86
1986-87
1987-88
1988-89
1989-90
1990-91
1991-92

LEVEL

GROWTH

19452
20998
23110
28994
35216
38156
44808
53489
62958
77591
87779
99505

17.37
7.95
10.06
25.46
21.46
8.37
17.41
19.37
17.70
23.24
13.13
13.36

POST-LIBERALIZATION ERA.
YEAR
1992-93
1993-94
1994-95
1995-96
1996-97
1997-98
1998-99
1999-00
2000-01
2001-02
2002-03
2003-04
2004

LEVEL

110779
138672
169283
194457
199985
226402
259285
280555
303311
337970
369061
436429
416982*

Source: Different issues of Reserve Bank of India Bulletin.

Note: * indicates value of the corresponding variable up to 26th March 2004

GROWTH

11.33
25.18
22.07
14.87
2.84
13.21
14.52
8.20
8.11
11.43
9.20
18.25
(-) 4.45

18

Table 3
Balance of Payment Summary
OVERALL
CAPITAL
YEAR CURRENT
ACCOUNT TO GDP ACCOUNT TO GDP BLANCE TO GDP
RATIO
RATIO
RATIO
PRE-LIBERALIZATION ERA.
(-) 1.70
1.01
(-) 0.691
1980-81
(-) 1.87
0.385
(-) 1.48
1981-82
(-) 1.93
1.19
(-) 0.749
1982-83
(-) 1.67
1.38
(-) 0.291
1983-84
(-) 1.29
1.68
0.389
1984-85
(-) 2.39
2.21
(-) 0.177
1985-86
(-)
2.09
2.07
(-) 0.022
1986-87
(-) 1.99
2.07
0.080
1987-88
(-) 3.06
3.09
0.026
1988-89
(-) 2.60
2.65
0.052
1989-90
(-) 3.40
2.52
(-) 0.875
1990-90
(-) 0.379
1.61
1.23
1991-91
POST-LIBERALIZATION ERA.
(-)
1.90
1.76
(-) 0.131
1992-93
(-) 0.465
3.89
3.43
1993-94
(-) 1.15
3.13
1.98
1994-95
(-) 1.83
1.45
(-) 0.377
1995-96
(-) 1.31
3.26
1.95
1996-97
(-) 1.50
2.70
1.20
1997-98
(-) 1.05
2.19
1.14
1998-99
(-)
1.16
2.74
1.58
1999-00
(-) 0.603
2.06
1.46
2000-01
0.328
2.41
2.74
2001-02
0.891
2.61
3.50
2002-03
Source: Handbook of Statistics on Indian Economy, Reserve Bank of India and RBI Bulletin.
Note: All the figures are in percentage.

19
TABLE: 4
Indias Exchange Rates with Major Currencies & Depreciation (-) /Appreciation (+)
of Rupee in 2003
APPR.
APPR. YEN
MONTH
US$
APPR. EURO APPR.
(+) /
(+) /
(+) /
(+) /
DEPR.
DEPR.
DEPR.
DEPR.
(-)
(-)
(-)
(-)
0.42
50.78
(-) 3.8 77.32 (-) 1.5 0.4026 (-) 2.51
JANUARY 47.84
FEBRUARY
47.65
0.4
51.36 (-) 1.11 76.85
0.61
0.3989
0.94
MARCH
47.55
0.2
51.4
(-) 0.09 75.29
2.07
0.4009 (-) 0.51
APRIL
47.28
0.58
51.43 (-) 0.06 74.49
1.08
0.394
1.77
MAY
47.01
0.58
54.41 (-) 5.47 76.24 (-) 2.3
0.4
(-) 1.5
JUNE
46.63
0.82
54.44 (-) 0.07 77.37 (-) 1.46 0.3947
1.33
JULY
46.15
1.03
52.48
3.74
75.02
3.13
0.389
1.47
AUGUST
45.87
0.61
51.13
2.64
73.11
2.62
0.3859
0.81
SEPTEMBER
45.75
0.26
51.27 (-) 0.27 73.54 (-) 0.59 0.3965 (-) 2.69
OCTOBER
45.30 (-) 0.17 52.97 (-) 3.21 75.94 (-) 3.21 0.4137 (-) 4.16
NOVEMBER
45.40
1.01
53.11 (-) 0.26 76.68 (-) 0.96 0.4157 (-) 0.47
DECEMBER 45.59 (-) 0.24 55.84 (-) 4.89 79.57 (-) 3.64 0.4217 (-) 1.42
Source: Handbook of Statistics on Indian Economy, Reserve Bank of India and different publications of
Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCI&S).

TABLE: 5
Indias Export Performance (U.S.A. and other OECD countries)
$ US million

OECD COUNTRIES
YEAR EXP.
IMP.
5595.3
1993-94 5281.85
1994-95 6479.41 7097.35
1995-96 7770.51 9533.19
1996-97 7434.58 9252.62
1997-98 8038.59 10549.65
1998-99 7454.4 10569.64
1999-00 7987.65 9758.32
2000-01 8800.08 10399.01
2001-02 8319.62 10273.06
2002-03 9172.75 10846.86

U.S.A.
NET EXP. EXP.
IMP.
NET EXP.
(-) 11175.80 3994.87 2738.81
1256.06
(-) 13855.40 5022.08 2906.53
2115.55
(-) 16133.00 5528.67 3866.98
1661.69
(-) 16921.3 6560.95
3689
2871.95
(-) 17968.6 6809.44 3721.36
3088.08
(-) 17475.2 7198.03 3639.37
3558.66
(-) 19459.00 8393.85 3568.3
4825.55
(-) 21604.20 9251.55 2844.37
6407.18
(-) 20275.00 8542.34 3160.34
5382
(-) 23883.70 10883.76
4429
6454.76

Source: Handbook of Statistics on Indian Economy, Reserve Bank of India and different publications
of Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCI&S).

Note: In the category of other OECD countries we have included: Denmark, France,
Germany, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Italy and U.K.

20

TABLE: 6
Some Important Macroeconomic Indicators
YEAR SAVINGS LESS
INVESTMENT TO GDP
RATIO

GROSS FISCAL
DEFICIT TO GDP
RATIO

CURRENT ACCOUNT
BALANCE TO GDP
RATIO

PRE-LIBERALIZATION ERA
1980-81
1981-82
1982-83
1983-84
1984-85
1985-86
1986-87
1987-88
1988-89
1989-90
1990-91
1991-92

5.72
1.97
3.27
4.78
5.25
3.77
4.30
6.48
5.13
6.89
8.08
7.71

6.38
5.70
6.27
6.56
7.82
8.76
9.47
8.56
8.17
8.13
8.74
6.166

(-) 1.70
(-) 1.87
(-) 1.93
(-) 1.67
(-) 1.29
(-) 2.39
(-) 2.09
(-) 1.99
(-) 3.06
(-) 2.60
(-) 3.40
(-) 0.379

POST-LIBERALIZATION ERA

5.50
1992-93
9.78
1993-94
9.38
1994-95
4.70
1995-96
7.45
1996-97
6.39
1997-98
8.41
1998-99
9.23
1999-00
10.56
2000-01
11.48
2001-02
2002-03
Source: National Account Statistics (new series), CSO.
Note: All the figures are in percentage.

5.97
7.71
6.29
5.61
5.37
6.40
7.09
5.96
6.27
6.81
6.49

(-) 1.90
(-) 0.465
(-) 1.15
(-) 1.83
(-) 1.31
(-) 1.50
(-) 1.05
(-) 1.16
(-) 0.603
0.328
0.891

21
TABLE: 7
Some Important Macroeconomic Indicators
YEAR

1980-81
1981-82
1982-83
1983-84
1984-85
1985-86
1986-87
1987-88
1988-89
1989-90
1990-91
1991-92

CONSUMPTION
TO GDP RATIO

91.43
90.24
87.08
87.79
86.04
84.11
83.72
82.34
79.07
77.34
75.77
75.75

SAVINGS
SAVINGS
INVESTMENT
TO GDP
TO GDP
TO GDP
RATIO*
RATIO**
RATIO***
PRE-LIBERALIZATION ERA

17.06
15.64
15.45
15.82
17.56
18.12
17.76
20.60
20.91
22.56
24.48
22.24

20.85
20.62
20.27
19.43
20.68
21.71
21.19
23.07
23.23
24.42
25.70
24.43

INVESTMENT
TO GDP RATIO
^

11.34
13.68
12.18
11.04
12.31
14.35
13.45
14.11
15.78
15.67
16.39
14.54

9.30
11.17
11.88
10.71
11.50
12.02
12.50
10.68
10.60
10.59
10.39
9.78

16.94
14.31
16.20
20.89
16.22
17.48
16.12
18.44
17.91
17.88

9.51
9.07
9.62
8.48
7.73
7.24
7.17
7.66
7.07
7.01

POST-LIBERALIZATION ERA
1992-93
1993-94
1994-95
1995-96
1996-97
1997-98
1998-99
1999-00
2000-01
2001-02

74.42
73.56
72.42
71.35
72.67
70.62
71.30
72.07
70.73
70.99

22.44
24.08
25.58
25.59
23.67
23.88
24.54
27.67
28.47
29.37

24.20
24.78
27.42
27.84
25.51
25.33
23.46
26.58
25.94
26.58

Source: National Account Statistics (new series), CSO

Note: All the statistics in percentage.
*, **, *** , ^ are private savings to GDP ratio, national savings to GDP ratio, private investment to
GDP ratio and public investment to GDP ratio respectively.

22
Table 8
State-wise Percentage of Population Below Poverty Line in India
1973-74
1977-78
1983-84
1987-88
1993-94
1999-00
%
%
%
%
%
%

State / UT
Andhra
Pradesh
Arunachal
Pradesh
Assam
Bihar
Goa
Gujarat
Haryana
Himachal
Pradesh
Jammu and
Kashmir
Karnataka
Kerala
Madhya
Pradesh
Maharashtra
Manipur
Meghalaya
Mizoram
Nagaland
Orissa
Punjab
Rajasthan
Sikkam
Tamil Nadu
Tripura
Uttar Pradesh
West Bengal
Andaman
and Nicobar
Islands
Chandigarh
Dadra and
Nagar Haveli
Delhi
Daman and
Diu
Lakshadweep
Pondicherry
All-India
Mean
SD
COV

48.86

39.31

28.91

25.86

22.19

15.77

51.93
51.21
61.91
44.26
48.15
35.36

58.32
57.15
61.55
37.23
41.23
29.55

40.88
40.77
62.22
18.9
32.79
21.37

36.22
36.21
52.13
24.52
31.54
16.64

39.35
40.86
54.96
14.92
24.21
25.05

33.47
36.09
42.6
4.4
14.07
8.74

26.39

32.45

16.4

15.45

28.44

7.63

40.83
54.47
58.79

38.97
48.78
52.22

24.24
38.24
40.42

23.82
37.53
31.79

25.17
33.16
25.43

3.48
20.04
12.72

61.78
53.24
49.96
50.2
50.32
50.81
66.18
28.15
46.14
50.86
54.94
51
57.07
63.43

61.78
55.88
53.72
55.19
54.38
56.04
70.07
19.27
37.42
55.89
54.79
56.88
49.05
60.52

49.78
43.44
37.02
38.81
36
39.25
65.28
16.18
34.46
39.71
51.66
40.03
47.07
54.85

43.07
40.41
31.35
33.92
27.52
34.43
55.58
13.2
35.15
36.06
43.39
35.23
41.46
44.72

42.52
36.86
33.76
37.92
25.66
37.92
48.56
11.77
27.41
41.43
35.03
39.01
40.85
35.66

37.43
25.02
28.54
33.87
19.47
32.67
47.15
6.16
15.28
36.55
21.12
34.44
31.15
27.02

55.56
27.96

55.42
27.32

52.13
23.79

43.88
14.67

34.47
11.35

20.99
5.75

46.55
49.61

37.2
33.23

15.67
26.22

67.11
12.41

50.84
14.69

17.14
8.23

15.8
25.04
37.4
35.97
31.802813
11.184037
35.166816

4.44
15.6
21.67
26.1
21.521875
12.388167
57.560819

59.68
53.82
54.88
49.9812903
9.89189862
19.791203

52.79
53.25
51.32
48.285484
12.069334
24.995782

42.36
50.05
44.48
37.706452
13.145667
34.863177

34.95
41.46
38.86
34.247742
12.506225
36.516934

Source: NSSO - various rounds and own calculations

23
Table 9
Year

TOI

COV

1973-74

8.825059

19.7912

1977-78

12.58812

24.99578

1983-84

12.6399

34.86318

1987-88

11.99442

36.51693

1993-94

18.32613

35.16682

1999-00

21.21388

57.56082

Source: Foreign Trade Statistics of India, NSSO and own calculations

Figure 1
Trends in Trade Openness and
Coefficient of Variation in Poverty
70
60
50
De
gr
ee
s

40
30
20
10
0
1973-74

1977-78

1983-84

1987-88

1993-94

Years

Trade Openess

COV of Poverty across States

1999-00

24

Table 10
(in Millions)
Year
1985
1986
1987
1988
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002

Unemployment
levels in India
26.27
30.13
30.25
30.05
32.78
34.89
36.76
36.31
36.04
36.69
36.74
37.43
39.14
40.09
40.37
41.34
42.07
41.17

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Government of India

25

Table 11
Table Showing Annual Growth Rates of Real Informal Wage for
States and Union Territories in India
1984-85 to 1989-90 to 1994-95 to 1999-00 to Post Reform
1989-90
1994-95
1999-00 2000-01
Average
States
-14.9383 38.37914 0.351421 5.54216
14.75757
AP
-12.5909 9.400387 0.502013 19.94701
9.949804
AS
-12.4796 9.259229 -0.91022 37.41843
15.25582
BH
-8.01461 5.856186 3.761828 9.471879
6.363298
GJ
-15.417
23.39205 -4.11872 33.07289
17.44874
HY
-11.5206
-0.34082 3.509483 24.55454
9.241068
HP
-12.8237 21.54953 7.021524 13.43834
14.00313
KA
-14.8953 12.55645 2.686628 21.20452
12.1492
KE
-12.6123 22.41174 1.455013 13.11878
12.32851
MP
-6.4
9.7482
5.247609 11.28708
8.760962
MH
-13.1553 22.78583 -2.38878 33.1919
17.86298
OR
-15.1443 12.20414 -1.06954 44.061
18.39853
PN
-15.4959 32.53101 -1.34439 33.03571
21.40744
RJ
-10.1074 6.406688 14.13201 11.49062
10.67644
TN
-14.3066 14.89337 -5.45877 45.36927
18.26796
TR
-13.2014 18.00436 -1.58454 26.79013
14.40332
UP
-11.2556 11.41085 -7.25447 15.29931
6.485231
WB
14.62978 3.202789 2.910365
6.914311
AN
19.21098 5.496664 12.4677
12.39178
CH
9.828439 -4.01589 37.7676
14.52672
DN
13.26679 20.39249 12.10498
15.25476
DH
-0.21334 9.929694 7.832409
5.849589
LA
20.77112 -3.96475 -18.5548
-0.58281
PO
20.50309 0.947838 23.74566
15.06553
GO
20.71262 2.838103 33.64066
19.06379
JK
24.9116 -4.18481 26.83254
15.85311
MA
18.91503 -5.28746 33.57459
15.73405
ME
19.93168 -6.92451 24.69716
12.56811
MI
15.62657 -1.96228 25.16228
12.94219
NA
28.81384 -0.01264 42.15758
23.65293
SI
Source: NSS Reports on Unorganized Sector in India, NSSO Various
Rounds, and Own Calculations

26

Figure 2
Annual Growth Rates of Informal Real Wage
50
40
30

10
0
-10
-20

84-85 89-90

89-90 94-95

R
J
TN
TR
U
P
W
B
AN
C
H
D
N
D
H
LA
PO
G
O
JK
M
A
M
E
M
I
N
A
SI

G
J
H
Y
H
P
KA

KE
M
P
M
H
O
R
PN

-30
AP
AS
BH

Percentage

20

States
94-95
99-00

99-00 00-01

PostRefAvg

27
CURRICULUM VITAE

Name:
Address:
Tel:
Fax:
E-mail address:

Sugata Marjit
Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta
R-1, B. P. Township, Calcutta - 700 094,India
91-33-2462 5794 / 5795 / 7252
91-33-2462 6183
smarjit@hotmail.com

Date of Birth:
December 4, 1959
Marital Status:
Married
Citizenship:
Indian
Academic Qualifications and Awards:
*
BA (hons.) in Economics, Presidency College, Calcutta, First Class Third, National
Scholarship for Post Graduate Studies
*
MA in Economics, Calcutta University, 1980, First Class First
*
MA in Economics, University of Rochester, 1983, joined the Department of
Economics as a research fellow in fall 1981
*
Ph.D. in Economics, University of Rochester, 1985, thesis defended in the Fall
1984, special dissertation fellowship awarded in summer 1984

Current Position:

Reserve Bank of India Professor of Industrial Economics, Centre

for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, India

Complete CV: www.saneinetwork.org/pdf/researchers/SugataMarjit.pdf

Positions Held (India):
Reserve Bank of India Professor of Industrial Economics-CSSS, Calcutta, May 2003Sukhamoy Chakravorty Professor of Economics - CESP, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi September 2000 - December 2000. (On leave from CSSS)
Professor, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences (CSSS) Calcutta, Feb 1997 May 2003.
Professor, Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta, Dec 1994 - Feb 1997
Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor), Monash University, 1994, Feb-Nov
Reader (Associate Professor), Jadavpur University, 1989-1993
Lecturer, Jadavpur University, 1985-1989
Projects Completed and Underway:
Recipient of research projects sponsored by the Export-Import Bank of India for
measuring "Transactions Costs of Indian Exports", 1998.
United Bank of India for "Analytical History of the United Bank of India, 1950-2000", by
the Industrial Development Bank of India for "Interest Rates, Investment Demand and
Industrial Growth - A Medium Term Study".
The Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India for An Analytical
Appraisal of the Tolerable Limits of the NPAs of Indian Banks.
SANEI V project on Trade Potentials of South Asian Economies Under the New Global
Trade Regime: The Role of Some Non-Price Factors A Case Study of India,
Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, 2002-2003.
Also awarded a research grant by the Global Development Network for conducting
research on Trade Problems in South Asia.
Project underway for SANEI VI, Globalization, Income Inequality and Regional
Disparity Analyzing the Indian Experience in the 1990s.
Project underway for ENRECA, Denmark, Globalization and Industrial Disparity An
Interregional Perspective.

28
Awards and Membership:
Regularly appears as an economic commentator in the well-known Television channels,
All India Radio and the BBC.
Panchanan Chakravarty Memorial Award awarded by the Bengal Economic Association
for promoting teaching and research in economics (1999) in Bengal.
Recipient of the best paper award of US$10000 from the Global Development Network
(World Bank) on the theme Globalization and Inequality (2003)
Recently made member of the committee in charge of suggesting future reforms in
Trade, Industry Competition, and Private sector development set up by the Government
of India in collaboration with Asian Development Bank.
Chairman of the Jury Committee for the International Economics Research Award
(2000) given by The Export-Import Bank of India.
Has been trained as a North-Indian classical vocalist for many years and have performed
in many concerts in India, Europe, USA and Australia. Awarded by the State Drama
Academy, Government of West Bengal, India, for composing the best musical score for
a play in 1995.
Research Interest and Selected Recent Publications:
International economics; economic development; economics of corruption and
governance; banking and finance; rational choice models of political economy; West
Bengal economy and Indian economy.
India's exports: An analytical study (with Ajitava Raychaudhuri)

Publication: Delhi; Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.

(With Rajat Acharyya) International Trade, Wage Inequality and The Developing
Economy - A General Equilibrium Approach. Research Monograph, Springer-Physica
Verlag, 2003.
(Edited with N. Singh) Foreign Investment, Technology Transfer and Joint Ventures
in Developing Countries. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003.
The Role of International Fragmentation in the Development Process. (With R. Jones)
American Economic Review, May 2001.
Economic Reform and Informal wage A General Equilibrium Analysis
Source: Journal of Development Economics, 72: 371-378.
Protecting Consumers through Protection: The Role of Tariff-Induced Technology
Transfer (with T. Kabiraj), Source: European Economic Review v47, n1 (February
2003): 113-24.
Resolving the Credibility Problem of an Honest Government: A Case for Foreign
Investment Subsidy. Source: Review of International Economics v7, n4 (November
1999): 625-31.
The Three Faces of Factor Intensities (with R. Jones and H. Beladi). Source: Journal of
International Economics v48, n2 (August 1999): 413-20.
Complementarity between Import Competition and Import Promotion. (With H. Beladi).
Journal of Economic Theory v86, n2 (June 1999): 280-85.
Editorial Work
Member, Editorial Boards of
Pacific Economic Review (Blackwell)
Journal of Emerging Market Finance (Sage)
(Ex. member)Review of International Economics (Blackwell)
(Ex. Assoc. Editor) Review of Development Economics (Blackwell)
Editorial Referee For
American Economic Review
Bulletin for Economic Research

29
Canadian Journal of Economics
Economica
Economics Letters
Economic Journal
European Economic Review
European Journal of Political Economy
Group Decision and negotiation
International Economic Review
International Journal of Industrial Organization
International Review of Economics and Finance
Journal of Quantitative Economics
Journal of Economic Integration
Journal of International Trade and Economic Development
Journal of Development Economics
Keio Economic Studies
Rand Journal of Economics
Review of International Economics
Regional Science and Urban Economics
Zeitschrift fur Nationalokonomie
Visiting Positions
SUNY (State University of New York) at Buffalo, U.S.A., fall 1986. Visiting
Assistant Professor
Cornell University, U.S.A., summer 1988. Visiting Assistant Professor
University of Florida, Gainesville, U.S.A., fall 1988. Visiting Assistant Professor Pennsylvania State University, Business School, spring 1989, Visiting Asst.
Professor
University of Konstanz, Germany, summer 1992, Guest Professor
University of Rochester, U.S.A., spring 1992. Visiting Associate Professor Chinese University of Hong Kong, Dept. of Decision Sciences, spring 1996.
Visiting Professor
Chinese University of Hong Kong, Dept. of Economics, spring 1999, Visiting
Professor
Northern Illinois University, Dept. of Economics, Spring 2000, - Visiting
Professor
City University of Hong Kong, Dept. of economics and Finance, spring 2001Visiting Professor
Singapore Management University- School of Economics, Spring 2003
Visiting Professor

30
Curriculum Vitae
Name:
SAIBAL KAR
Sex:
Male
Date of Birth:
18th January, 1971
Permanent Residence:
Kolkata, 700 027, India.
Phone Number (Res.):
91-33-2479 0470.
Phone Number (Work):
91-33-2462 5794.
Fax:
91-33-2462 6183
E-mail:
skar1801@yahoo.com / saibal@cssscal.org
Citizenship:
Indian.
Education (Recent First):
1998-2002:
Ph.D. Degree in Economics (August 2002), Northern Illinois
University, USA.
Fields: Labor Economics, Public Economics.
1996-1997:
Research Student, Research Training Programme,
Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, India.
1993-1995:
M. Sc. (Master of Science) Degree in Economics, Calcutta
University, India.
Fields: International Trade, Development Economics.
1989-1992:
B.Sc. (Bachelor of Science) Degree (Hons.) in Economics,
Asutosh College, Calcutta University, India.
Fields and Specializations: Labor Economics, International Trade, Public Economics,
and Applied Microeconomics.
Thesis Title:
Asymmetric Information, Migration and Self-Employment.
Ph. D. Dissertation, August 2002, Northern Illinois University,
USA.
Research and Teaching (Recent First):
2004(September-)
RBI Fellow in Economics, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences,
Calcutta, India.
2003(Mar)-2004(Aug) RBI Research Officer, CSSSC.
2002-2003
Research Scholar, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta,
India.
2000-2002:
Teaching Assistant, Northern Illinois University, USA.
1999-2000:
Instructor in Economics, Northern Illinois University, USA.
1998-1999:
Research Assistant, Economics Department, Northern Illinois
University, USA.
1997-1998:
Research Associate, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences,
Calcutta, India.
1995-1996:
Research Assistant, Economics Department, Calcutta University,
India. (University Grant Commission, India- Project on Informal
Sector in India.)
Publications (Recent First):
Skill Formation and Trade Reform Welfare Perspective of Developing
Countries. (with Hamid Beladi), Japan and the World Economy, 16 (2004), 3554.

31

Trade, Wages and Labour Mobility.

(with Sugata Marjit), in Aditya Bhattacharjea and Sugata Marjit (eds.)
Globalization and the Developing Economies; (2004), Manohar Books, New
Delhi, India.
Informal Sector in General Equilibrium: Welfare Effects of Trade Policy Reforms.
(with Sugata Marjit), International Review of Economics and Finance, 10
(2001), 289-300.
Gradual Trade Reform and the Current Account - The Role of Intermediate
Goods. (with Sugata Marjit), Keio Economic Studies, XXXVII (1), 2000, 63-69.
Financial Volatility and Convertibility- Some Methodological Issues.
(with Sugata Marjit), Economic and Political Weekly, XXXIII (8), 1998, 401406.
Capital Mobility and Informal Wage in a Small Economy--Two Examples
(with Sugata Marjit), forthcoming, South Asia Economic Journal (Vol. 5, no
2).
Submissions and Conference Presentations:

Economic Reform, Skill Formation and Foreign Capital (with Basudeb GuhaKhasnobis) submitted for publication.
Asymmetric Information, Immigrant Labor and Self-Employment in a Rich
Country- A Survey, submitted for publication.
Asymmetric Information, International Migration of Labor and Self-Employment
of Skilled Immigrants and Natives (with Eliakim Katz, working paper, NIU,
presented at the Indian Statistical Institute Conference on Methods and Models in
Economics, March, 2003).
Trade Reform, Capital Mobility and Informal Wage- Theory and Evidence (with
Sugata Marjit, Occasional Paper, CSSSC; submitted for publication, presented at
Sharing Global Prosperity conference at WIDER, Helsinki, 5-7 September, 2003;
Global Development Award Finalist in the 5th GDN Conference held in New
Delhi during 28-30 Jan. 2004).
Agricultural Trade Reform - A General Equilibrium Explanation for Developed
Countries. (with Sugata Marjit and Hamid Beladi), submitted for publication.
Wage Determination of Child Labor and Effect of Trade Reform (with Basudeb
Guha-Khasnobis), presented at Sharing Global Prosperity conference presentation
at WIDER, Helsinki, 5-7 September, 2003).
Capital Mobility and Informal Wage in a Small Economy--Two Examples
(with Sugata Marjit), submitted for publication.
Pro-Market Reform and Informal wage Theory and Contemporary Indian
Perspective (with Sugata Marjit), submitted for publication.
Trade Reform and Informal Labor A Formal-Informal Characterization of the
Heckscher-Ohlin Framework, (with Sugata Marjit and Hamid Beladi) submitted
for publication.
Emigration and Wage Inequality (with Sugata Marjit) submitted for publication.
Entrepreneurial Culture, Occupational Choice and Tax Policy - A Theoretical
Note. (with V. Mukherjee, submitted for publication).

32

Projects Undertaken
Economic Reform and Poverty: The Indian Experience Paper presented at 5th
Annual GDN Conference held in New Delhi, 28-30 January, 2004. Project by
WIDER, UNU, Helsinki. Final report submitted in May 2004.
Working on project entitled, Globalization, Income Inequality and Regional
Disparity Analyzing the Indian Experience in the 1990s, under SANEI VI,
First Draft to presented, final report due March, 2005.
Completed Project on Trade Potentials of South Asian Economies Under the
New Global Trade Regime: The Role of Some Non-Price Factors A Case Study
of India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, 2002-2003. Presented Final report at
SANEI V Conference in Colombo, Sri Lanka, 15-18 august, 2003.
Completed EX-IM Bank of India project on "Transactions Costs of Indian
Exports", 1998.
Recipient of GDN (Global Development Network, Washington D.C.) project on
Trade Liberalization, Migration and Poverty under Macroeconomic Policy
Challenges for Low-Income Countries. Final Report submitted, November 2004.

Editorial Referee

Review of Development Economics.

Visiting Positions

Sabbatical Fellow at WIDER, UNU, Helsinki, May-July, 2004.

Computer Skills
Comprehensive knowledge of Econometrics software packages, including
SAS, LIMDEP, STATA, SPSS.
Thorough knowledge of MAPLE 5.0, Scientific Word, MS Office.

Contact Information: Dr. Saibal Kar

Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta.
R-1 B.P. Township, Kolkata 700 094, India.
Ph. 91-33-2462 5794/95/7252. Fax: 91-33-2462 6183.
E-mail: skar1801@yahoo.com

33
Name:
Date of birth:
Sex:
Citizenship:
Residential address:
Telephone number (res.):
E-mail ID:
Present Occupation:
Address of the employer:

Rituparna Bhattacharya
10th August 1980
Female
Indian
Shishumahal, P.O.: Daulatpur, Kolkata: 700139
2490 3487, 3096 0964
bhattacharya_rituparna@yahoo.co.in
Research Assistant in Centre for Studies in Social
Sciences, Calcutta, under the RBI Endowment Scheme, (June,
2004 ).
CSSSC, R-1, B.P. Township, Kolkata - 700094

Education:
Year

Degree

1996

Madhyamik

1998

Higher Secondary

Awarding Authority
WB Board of Secondary
Education
WB Council of Higher
Secondary Education

Akra Saktigarh
Rabindra Vidyapith
Sivanath Sastri
College

Jadavpur University
Jadavpur University

B. A. (Hons)
in Economics
M. A. in Economics

2001
2003

Institution

Grade
82.33% (Ist Div.)
80.1%

(Ist Div.)

Jadavpur University

65.2%

(Ist Class)

Jadavpur University

67.44% (Ist class)

Project Experiences:
Period
August, 1999
to
April, 2001

December
2001 to
December
2002
November,
2002 to
January, 2003
September
2003 to
January 2004
February 2004
to May 2004

Name of the Project

Socio-Economic Survey
on Health &
Education

Institute
Economics
Department, Jadavpur
University.

Child Relief and You

(Voluntary service)
Gender Ethics &
Womens Studies
Education
Disaster Management:
Floods in West Bengal
and Early Warning
System
Groundwater markets in
West Bengal, India:
emergence, evolution
and market structure

Applied Ethics
Institute of India.
Centre for
environmental
Management and
Participatory
Development
Center for Studies in
Social Sciences,
Calcutta

Job Description
st

I part - Household survey: Revealing the responsiveness

of the mass across income groups towards
private and public health care services
2nd part - Data analysis using economic and statistical
tools
3rd part - Complete report preparing
Working on the base line data, preparing detail reports of
surveys, data interpretation
Survey based project on women awareness towards
women rights and other gender responsive issues coming
across women life cycle
Analyzing flood history of West Bengal focusing at
various socio-eco-political issues in the light of disaster
mitigation
Analyzing the data collected on 5 major districts of West
Bengal extensive use of econometric and economic tools
(mainly the Latent Variable models) and software
packages (LIMDEP)

34

System experience & proficiency:

Operating System:
Applications:

Windows.
MS-Word, MS-Excel, Photoshop, PageMaker,
I-Leap, Corel.

Econometrics Packages:

Micro fit, LIMDEP, SPSS.

Communications:

Bengali, English, Hindi

Areas of Specialization:
Econometrics and optimization technique.
Environment and resource management.
Awards:
Second rank in M.A. (Economics).
Third Rank in B.A. (Economics Hons.).
National Scholarship Award in the year 1994.
National Scholarship Award in the year 1992.