This paper documents that despite relatively robust output growth, India has experienced a marked and puzzling slowdown in labour productivity over the last decade. This we argue, is partly because of a intensification in dualism. While employment rates have risen, across most kinds of occupations, there is a proportionately greater shift toward self-employment and informal activities (especially among women), which are lower productivity sectors. Overall we document a sustained reversal in labour reallocation toward lower-productivity sectors, especially towards agriculture. We show that this pattern is unusual in international perspective. Sectoral, household, and gender-based evidence indicates that rising per capita incomes have been sustained through labour intensification despite stagnant or declining earnings per worker. An additional and puzzling fact is that there has been a decline in labour productivity growth even in larger firms. Taken together, the findings point to an intensification of dualism-with some growth in formal higher value added activity being offset by much larger growth in activity in lower value added sectors.

Authors:

Amit Basole & Arjun Jayadev

The Indian Coastline is a dynamic mosaic of diverse landscapes, stretching from the salt marshes of  Kachchh to the fertile deltas of the East. Characterised by golden beaches, dense mangrove forests like the Sundarbans, and rugged rocky cliffs, it hosts a vibrant marine ecosystem rich in biodiversity. These coastal waters support millions of livelihoods through fishing and trade, while acting as a crucial buffer against monsoonal shifts and rising sea levels. This booklet offers a glimpse of how the climate of the Indian coastal region is expected to change in the coming decades. By using high-resolution data at a granular 25 x 25 km scale, this booklet provides precise climate projections that are essential for developing strategies to build climate resilience and adaptation. Derived from CMIP6 models corrected for regional bias, the booklet aims to help various stakeholders make informed decisions in the face of climate change. By providing precise climate projections, it helps various stakeholders — including policymakers, local authorities, and communities — prepare for specific risks in their regions. These insights will guide decisions on how to adapt to climate changes and mitigate risks, ensuring that strategies are practical and effective in safeguarding lives, livelihoods, and ecosystems across India. The insights presented here are based on the SSP2‑4.5 scenario which assumes that society will take moderate steps to reduce emissions and adapt to climate change, leading to a future with moderate effects.

The March 2026 issue takes you on a journey – learning mathematics does have challenges and is all the more valuable because of these, but the role of the teacher is to scaffold this climb and to help students enjoy the view at each peak that they surmount. We discuss the need for, as well as the challenges of, conducting summative assessment at the primary level. But we also give you delightful wayside stops to stare at clocks, at posters of ten-frames, at activities with polyominoes, at interesting websites. Read on and enjoy!

Science education is an interdisciplinary field of enquiry with conceptual frameworks drawing from the foundational disciplines of education, besides the multiple sub-disciplines of science. An interdisciplinary understanding has been critical to postgraduate courses in science education. However, students continue to have a conventional understanding of the nature and practices of science, based on predominant experiences at school and undergraduate education. This article analyses two assignments which draw upon philosophical and sociological perspectives in science. It discusses the development of hybrid spaces for students in understanding and navigating the disciplines and their interests. Conceptual and rhetorical elements, particularly emphasising students’ extension of inferences and projection of personae, are illustrated as elements of the forward and backward search strategies. Such assignments are essential to develop a richer understanding of the nature of science and its complex interpretation compared to typical deifications in textbooks and pedagogic approaches. They also support students with diverse interests and backgrounds to navigate different disciplines and unique interests through the development of ​‘hybrid spaces’. Such spaces, at the boundaries of disciplines, writing conventions and students’ interests develop and reshape conventional understanding.

Youth in the Labour Market: Pathways from Learning to Earning

India is nearing the peak of its demographic dividend, with the share of the working-age population expected to begin declining after 2030. On the one hand, higher education in the country has become increasingly democratised with a rapid increase in the number of institutions. Graduate salaried earnings exceed non-graduates both at the time of entry into employment and over their lifetime. On the other hand, financial barriers continue to restrict access, particularly in professional fields such as engineering and medicine. The transition from education to employment remains a major challenge. The rise in the number of graduates has not been matched by commensurate growth in graduate employment. This year’s State of Working India report traces the arc of a young worker’s transition from school or college into employment, and how this has changed in the last forty years.

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All Figures (Figures 1.1−4.7, Figures 4.8−7.10 ) 

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Press Release (English | Hindi | Kannada)

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पाठशाला भीतर और बाहर का मार्च अंक शिक्षण के लिए उपयोगी अनुभवजन्य सामग्री को समेटे है। इस अंक में आप पढ़ेंगे कि विद्यार्थी उच्च कक्षाओं में तो पहुँच जाते हैं, लेकिन बहुत सारे विद्यार्थियों की दक्षता का स्तर पिछली कक्षाओं के अनुरूप नहीं बन पाता है। ऐसे में शिक्षकों के सम्मुख जो चुनौती होती है, उसका समाधान कैसे करें? शिक्षण योजना बनाकर शिक्षण करने के अनुभव और इससे बच्चों के सीखने में आए अन्तर को समझना हो या इबारती सवालों की इबारत में उलझे बच्चों की उलझन को सुलझाना, या ऐसे ही अन्य विविध विषयों पर बात करते लेख, सब इस अंक का हिस्सा हैं। हमेशा की तरह शिक्षकों की डायरी, इनसे मिलिए सहित, किताबों से दोस्ती और आइए, करके देखें जैसे सभी स्थाई स्तम्भ भी अंक में शामिल हैं। 

Childhood malnutrition is a significant challenge for India. Literature exploring the determinants of malnutrition has emphasised the importance of the local context. Malnutrition is an outcome of the various socio-economic forces that are entwined in local specificities. This makes it very important to keep the context in mind for designing policy and avoid ​“one-size-fits-all” solutions. In this context, this chapter takes a different route by exploring the spatial heterogeneity in the associations between variables known to impact childhood malnutrition. The variations in associations can be learnt from the data instead of being specified in an ad hoc a priori manner. This can give better insights into the spatiality of the context within which socio-economic processes interact to produce malnutrition. This analysis is performed in the context of rural Maharashtra using Mission Antyodaya and several other databases.

This paper examines whether attendance in full-day community creches is associated with improved nutritional outcomes among young children in rural India. Drawing on Monitoring and Information System data from creches supported by the Azim Premji Foundation in Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha and Chhattisgarh, we analyse longitudinal weight and height records for ~11,000 children aged six months to three years. We exploit variation in age at entry and duration of exposure to trace weight-for-age and weight for-height trajectories for children enrolled in these creches. At admission, children are substantially lighter and thinner than both WHO growth standards and children of the same age in the National Family Health Survey, 2019 – 21 (NFHS‑5) from the same districts of APF creches. Fixed-effects regressions show that longer exposure is systematically associated with higher final weight with stronger associations for children who enter at younger ages. We find evidence of catch-up growth as well, with the median child gaining more than 300 grams in weight for each month spent in the creche.

Authors:

Ashutosh Kumar, Dipa Sinha, and Arjun Jayadev

India exhibits high and persistent rates of undernutrition and a growing prevalence of micronutrient deficiencies — particularly anemia — as well as overweight and obesity. Addressing this triple burden requires diverse, nutritious diets, yet Indian diets remain limited in diversity and nutritional quality, characterized by heavy reliance on cereals and cereal-based foods. Previous studies have shown that diets consistent with India’s food-based dietary guidelines are unaffordable for a large proportion of the population. Using data from the 2023 – 24 Household Consumption Expenditure Survey, we characterize dietary composition and food expenditure in India. We then use derived commodity-level prices to provide updated and representative estimates of the cost and affordability of vegetarian and nonvegetarian diets that meet India’s food-based dietary guidelines. We find that Indian diets are high in visible fat consumption and that most protein is derived from low-quality sources, such as cereals, while consumption of nutrient-dense or high-protein foods remains limited even for the richest deciles. We estimate the daily cost of a healthy vegetarian diet at INR 63.6 per consumer unit and a non-vegetarian diet at INR 73.1 at the all-India level. An estimated 31.2% of urban and 56.6% of the rural population would need to increase their current food expenditure to meet the cost of a healthy diet. If instead we compare our costs against the threshold defined by the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) 2025 report, we find that 8.3% of urban and 32.6% of rural populations cannot afford a nutritionally adequate diet. While social safety nets subsidize cereals, thereby increasing affordability for the poorest, additional items such as spices and cooking fuel raise total costs. We assess these extensions and discuss policy implications.

Authors:

Kalyani Raghunathan, Anshuman Singh, Dipa Sinha

Developing country governments often launch new agricultural programmes without collecting pre-implementation survey data, making it difficult to evaluate the effects of such programmes. Leveraging the flexibility of granular pixel-level satellite panel data and a well-developed quasi-experimental policy evaluation design, we study a programme where pre-implementation data is unavailable. We estimate the effect of cash transfers on agricultural productivity in Telangana, India. Treatment and control regions are within 10 km on either side of the state border. They are identical in all respects except for the difference in exposure to policy treatment. Agricultural productivity increased in the major monsoon cropping season due to the cash transfer programme. The findings also reveal that cash transfers helped reduce productivity gaps between irrigated and rainfed agricultural areas. Our results are robust to two different sources of satellite data, three alternative indicators of productivity, two rounds of full-scale resampling, 100 rounds of small-scale resampling and three alternative border designs. Placebo regressions of two previous years also confirm our results. This approach to policy evaluation is applicable anywhere satellite data are available in the world.

Authors: Muddasir Ahmad Akhoon, Abhishek Shaw, Vidya Vemireddy

The author is interested in examining the process of introduction of reforms to explain why the same set of reforms failed to translate into growth in the 1990s in India but have had successful impacts on the economy in later political regimes. In particular, he wants to frame the process of introducing reforms within the socio-political context in India which brings unique challenges and political constraints. This book chapter intends to assess how political capacity and institutional mechanisms are key to understanding why reforms have failed in certain contexts.

In this paper, the researchers revisit the relevance of the agrarian question of capital and provide evidence of the dynamism in agriculture based on an empirical enquiry. They study the possibilities, channels and patterns of agrarian accumulation and its spillover on the nonagrarian accumulation dynamics in an agriculturally advanced region lying in central India. Based on this empirical study, they posit that the agrarian question of capital remains important at a regional scale in India. By bringing the focus back on the question of capital, the paper maps the contemporary agrarian change processes as being linked to the process of generation of agrarian surplus and contributes to the debate on the relevance of the agrarian question of capital in the Global South.

Authors: Sunit Arora, Deepak K Mishra

This paper examines the interaction between demographic change, employment absorption, and productivity growth across Indian states using a transparent accounting decomposition. Methodologically, we extend standard demographic dividend accounting by explicitly incorporating labor-market absorption, decomposing per capita Net State Domestic Product (NSDP) growth into output per employed worker, the employment-to-working-age population ratio, and the working-age share of the population. This employment-adjusted framework separates the mechanical contribution of age structure — the arithmetic demographic dividend — from labor-market dynamics and productivity performance. Using state-level data spanning 1994 – 2023, we document substantial heterogeneity in demographic transitions and growth experiences across Indian states. Declining dependency ratios provided a positive mechanical contribution to per capita growth in almost all states. However, this potential dividend was frequently muted — and in several cases fully offset — by falling employment-to-working-age ratios, particularly during the high-growth period from 2004 to 2017. At the same time, several better performing states, sustained high growth in output per working-age adult over long periods. A three-period decomposition (1994 – 2004, 2004 – 2017, and 2017 – 2023) reveals a marked shift in the composition of growth. While earlier phases were characterized by strong productivity growth alongside weak employment absorption, the post-2017 period exhibits a partial recovery in employment ratios accompanied by a broad-based slowdown in productivity per employed worker. We use the historical bounds implied by these decompositions to construct counterfactual growth trajectories, highlighting the limits of demographic advantage in the absence of employment-intensive productivity growth.

Biological invasions pose substantial economic threats globally, yet detailed cost assessments for many Global South nations, especially in Africa, remain scarce. This study presents the first comprehensive breakdown of the potential economic costs of biological invasions in Morocco. The researchers identified 343 invasive alien species, comprising approximately 1.11 percent of the country’s biodiversity. Using the InvaCost database, they retrieved cost estimates for 137 species with available records. They calculated the mean annual cost per species, adjusted these values both socio-economically (using World Bank Purchasing Power Parity) and climatically (via Köppen climatic regions), and extrapolated them based on species prevalence in Morocco. This yielded an estimated annual economic impact ranging from USD 1.14 billion (conservative adjusted value) to USD 5.13 billion (maximum scenario). Across all estimations, damage costs consistently exceeded management costs by one or two orders of magnitude. Despite challenges in extrapolating cost data from other regions, this study underscores the urgent need for more research and for targeted management and policy interventions to minimise the spread of invasive species and reduce their economic toll. Proactive measures in Morocco, coupled with international collaboration, will be critical to mitigating this socio-ecological crisis and ensuring long-term sustainability.

Authors: Jazila El Jamaai, Ahmed Taheri, Liliana Ballesteros-Mejia, Danish A. Ahmed, Alok Bang, Christophe Diagne, Franck Courchamp and Elena Angulo 

This paper investigates a striking puzzle in recent rural India: individual real wages have shown weak or stagnant growth for large segments of the labour force, while house hold per-capita incomes have risen materially and, in many cases, faster among lower deciles. Using microdata from the Periodic Labor Force Survey(PLFS)2017 – 2023, wedocu mentthese contrasting patterns and reconcile them. First we undertake a simple decompo sition that separates (i) average real wage per earner, (ii) the number of earners per house hold, and (iii) household size. Our empirical analysis shows that demographic and labour supply adjustments — chiefly an increase in earners per household driven by rising labour force participation and expanded non-farm employment — accountforthebulkofobserved gains in household per-capita income even as individual real wages remain subdued. Dis tributional analysis reveals that percentage growth has been relatively progressive (lower deciles recording larger proportional gains), but absolute level gaps persist and, in many cases, widen. We further disaggregate decile income by occupational category and find that lower deciles have seen significant shifts from casual work to self-employed status. Since the latter category provides, on average, higher incomes, this can partially explain muchof the observed progressivity of household income growth.

Authors:

Arjun Jayadev, Avinash M Tripathi and M.K Shravan

This issue of Learning Curve examines everyday challenges in India’s public education system, including rising household costs and persistent underfunding of teachers that affect access and learning. It highlights practical responses from the field, such as community libraries in Karnataka, a decentralised demonstration-based teacher professional development initiative from Madhya Pradesh, and inquiry-based learning through Bal Shodh Melas from the Uttarakhand experience. It also engages with policy debates, clarifying misconceptions around competency-based assessment and offering practical alternatives to the ongoing school consolidation and merger debate.

Authors:

Pebsworth, P. A., Dore, K. M., Hansen, M., Anand, S., & Zinner, D.

Science teachers often struggle to make space for themes that feel personal or are not directly linked to examinations. This issue focuses on two such themes: adolescence and birdwatching. ​‘Using science to support students in navigating adolescence’ illustrates how science can help students understand physical, emotional, and social changes, while creating a supportive space for discussion. ​‘Why introduce students to birdwatching?’ shows how a simple, low-cost activity can build core scientific practices such as observation, recording, comparison, and inference. Together, the articles offer practical ways to connect science teaching with students’ everyday lives and local environments.

This article examines rural transformation in India through a review of longitudinal village studies conducted over the past three decades. It argues that rural India is not undergoing structural transformation in the classical sense. While labour is steadily moving out of agriculture, this shift has not led to higher productivity in agriculture or the development of a robust rural nonfarm economy. Instead, what unfolds is a process of deagrarianisation, driven by out-migration of male workers to cities where they engage in informal nonfarm employment. This transition is uneven and remains deeply embedded in existing hierarchies of caste, class, and gender, which shape both access to opportunities and outcomes. By identifying common patterns across diverse regional contexts, the article shows how village studies provides a grounded perspective on the nature of rural change.

Author: 
C.R. Yadu

पाठशाला भीतर और बाहर का दिसम्बर अंक केन्द्रित है ​‘प्रारम्भिक बाल्यावस्था और शिक्षा’ पर। इस अंक में प्रारम्भिक बाल्यावस्था और शिक्षा पर केन्द्रित विविध अनुभव-आधारित आलेख, एक सैद्धान्तिक लेख, शिक्षकों की डायरी में दर्ज उनके अनुभव उन्हीं की कलम से, कुछ रोचक तथा आसानी से की जा सकने वाली गतिविधियाँ और ऐसी किताबें, जिनका उपयोग प्रारम्भिक बाल्यावस्था के लिए किया जा सके, शामिल हैं। साथ ही ​‘उम्मीद जगाते शिक्षक’ के अन्तर्गत एक आँगनवाड़ी कार्यकर्त्री, जिन्होंने अपने केन्द्र को बदलाव के नए स्तर दिए, की यात्रा के अनुभव, उनकी कहानी भी है। 

Urban blue spaces, such as lakes and rivers, are increasingly recognised for their ecological and social roles, yet their contributions to sustainable food systems remain understudied. Here, the researchers examine the extent and benefits of foraging in urban blue spaces across four major Indian cities through a survey of 1,200 users. We identify three forager groups, that is, ​‘rare’, ​‘occasional’ and ​‘frequent’ foragers, whose behaviours differ in frequency and practice. Women, the elderly and marginalised communities most frequently collect, share, cook and sell edibles. Access to home or community gardens strongly motivates occasional foragers. Frequent foragers emphasise benefits relating to nutrition and income, as well as culture and social capital, whereas occasional foragers appreciate nature- and culture-related benefits. The findings challenge conventional perspectives on urban food provisioning, highlighting urban blue spaces as vital yet overlooked spaces for food access and resilience. Integrating foraging into urban planning can enhance equitable food systems, fostering transformative change toward sustainable urban landscapes.

Authors: Sukanya Basu, Brenda Maria Zoderer, Harini Nagendra, Peter H Verburg, Tobias Plieninger 

This chapter critically examines the different conceptions and emerging paradigms in the discourse on inclusion in the context of education in India. The researcher interrogates the nature of inclusive education and argues for an epistemology that emerges from the paradoxes, diversity and disparities that characterise schools and classrooms in the Indian context. In doing so, the researcher scrutinises the emerging trends in education research and the ​‘new’ epistemology from the global North which attributes agency to the practitioner, the parent and the child to participate in the education discourse, shifting the equation of power in the construction of knowledge. In this chapter, she examines the connotations of these new, emerging trends for research, practice, and policy on inclusion for India. The chapter presents the tensions in arriving at conceptions of inclusive education and how that has impacted policy and its realisation in practice. The central thesis of the paper is constructed through a close examination of the different forms of marginalisation that characterise Indian classrooms, the situation of the disadvantaged child, the parent and the teacher in the context of education. 

Reducing gender disparities in workforce participation is an important policy goal in several developing countries. India, in particular, has historically had low levels of women’s workforce participation as compared to men and as compared to peer economies. Prior research has identified both supply and demand-side explanations for low levels of women’s participation in paid work. On the supply side, social norms constraining women’s mobility and autonomy are commonly invoked as one explanation. We test the relevance of such norms in explaining heterogeneity in women’s employment using district-level data from the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) 2015 – 16 and the Sixth Economic Census (2013). Norms indices are constructed using Principal Components Analysis for 640 districts of India. The findings indicate that less restrictive norms related to decision-making, mobility, and asset ownership are positively correlated with higher levels of women’s employment.

Authors:

Subhapriya Chakraborty and Amit Basole

The November 2025 issue of At Right Angles takes a look at the annual celebration of the National Day of Mathematics on December 22. Celebrating mathematics makes perfect sense to some, far less to others- with the articles in this issue, we hope to make persuasive arguments that cause shift towards those who love patterns, who enjoy discovery, who believe in celebrating reason, elegant arguments – in short, Mathematics!

The need to strengthen comprehensive primary health care towards ensuring ​“Health for All” is well established yet operationalising this has remained a challenge globally as well as in India. Based on a qualitative study of a collaborative initiative between the government and a civil society organisation, this article discusses what factors and processes explain successful implementation of primary health care in a remote rural area in central India.

Authors: Arima Mishra, Raman Kataria, Roseline Sagar, Pawan Singh, Pankaj Tiwari, Shivkant Tripathi, Vinay Vishwakarma, Sapna Mishra

The Shakti scheme, launched by the Government of Karnataka in June 2023, represents one of the most ambitious efforts in India to reimagine welfare by providing free public transport for women. Unlike welfare programmes based on targeted cash transfers, this scheme redefines inclusion through the provision of a universal, non-cash public service mobility. This report is an assessment of the evolution of the scheme with specific regard to the BMTC’s experience. In the period studied– January 2023 to March 2025, covering both pre- and post-implementation phases – the scheme generated a significant surge in bus usage across the state. With more than 2.89 crore trips recorded, a striking transformation in mobility patterns was observed. Importantly, women riders quickly outnumbered men on many of the busiest routes– especially in the Central Business District, reflecting a major shift in access to and usage of public transport. The ridership gains were particularly sharp in the first six months following the scheme’s launch and have since stabilised, indicating a sustained and regular usage pattern among women. The report is divided into three sections. In the first, the researchers discuss state-level free travel schemes. They address certain questions about Karnataka’s experience within wider debates about universalism versus targeting in social policy. In the second, they discuss the report, its methods and findings. In the final section, they discuss some potential paths forward.

This issue of our magazine brings together articles that point to a simple truth: meaningful reform rests on inclusion and enablement, which calls for an education system that expands possibilities for all learners, strengthens the capacities of teachers and Anganwadi workers, and finally draws on the voices of all stakeholders of the system in shaping the way forward.

पाठशाला भीतर और बाहर का यह विशेष अंक है। इस अंक के साथ पाठशाला पत्रिका ने 25 अंकों का सफ़र तय किया है। इस विशेष 25वें अंक में शामिल हैं 13 राज्यों से आई 25 शिक्षकों की डायरियाँ जिनमें दर्ज हैं उनके कक्षा अनुभव। साथ ही, 5 आलेख ​‘बन्धुता की शिक्षा’, ​‘शिक्षकों के विकास में सहयोग ही उनका सम्मान है’, ​‘शिक्षा और शिक्षक : ज़मीनी चुनौतियों को समझने की जरूरत’, ​‘विद्यार्थियों के जीवन को आकार देते हैं शिक्षक’, ​‘पाठशाला भीतर और बाहर के 25 अंकों का सफ़र’ शामिल हैं। ये आलेख शिक्षकों के काम को भरोसे के तौर पर देखते हैं, और आने वाले समय में शिक्षा में सकारात्मक बदलाव के प्रति आश्वस्ति जगाते हैं।