Discussions on development and the economy are incomplete without an understanding of how taxes are/​ought to be designed. The LLM offered by Azim Premji University seeks to investigate both the constitutive role (‘creating’ paradigms and structures that engage with abstract ideas such as equity, justice, fairness and efficiency) and instrumental role (operationalising and implementing state objectives) of the law in developmental practices. This course demonstrates that legislative design in income tax law plays both these roles. Indeed, because tax legislation plays both these roles imperfectly, complexity and inefficiency in tax law occur as a consequence. This course seeks to explore the possibilities, problems and limits of statutory instruments in a country’s economic life through an investigation of income tax legislation.