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Working Papers | 2009

Trends in Technical Progress in India .Analysis of Input-Output Tables from 1968 to 2003

Ravindra H. Dholakia, Astha Agarwalla, Aamir Bashir Bazaz, and Prasoon Agarwal

The paper is based on the 8 Input . Output (I-O) tables for the Indian economy available over a period of 36 years from 1968-69 to 2003-04. The technical progress (TP) in the context of the I-O tables is based on the concept of a production function defining the relationship between gross output and material inputs as well as value added at the disaggregated sectoral level. The paper attempts to answer the following questions: (i) Was the TP substantial and continuous throughout the period?; (ii) Was the rate of TP during the inward looking and outward looking growth strategy phases of the economy the same?; and (iii) Was the rate of TP at the disaggregated sectoral level almost constant over time?

In order to measure the rate of TP, the available eight national I-O tables in India are first made compatible for the number, scope and definitions of sectors as well as for prices by converting them at constant 1993-94 prices. Chenery-Watanabe coefficient is used for measuring the rate of TP for different sectors across the 8 I-O tables.

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Working Papers | 2009

Who Participates in Higher Education in India? Rethinking the Role of Affirmative Action

Rakesh Basant and Gitanjali Sen

This paper explores how socio-economic, especially socio-religious affiliations, and demographic characteristics of individuals influence participation in higher education (HE). It argues that appropriate measures of 'deficits' in participation should inform the nature and scope of affirmative action. The analytical and policy relevance of distinguishing between stock and flow measures, the differences in eligibility for HE across groups are emphasized. After controlling for relevant factors, the 'hierarchy of participation in higher education' that emerges from detailed analysis suggests that deficits for some marginalized groups are not high enough to justify reservation for these groups on the basis of low participation.

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Working Papers | 2009

Implications of Global Crisis:Integrate Sustainability with Organizational Culture

Rao Indu

Sustainability is an issue of escalating importance as a result of structural changes of organizations which are consolidating, downsizing, merging and outsourcing as well as due to the increasing complexity and unpredictability of the external environment. Understanding, assessing and managing organizational culture can help create both stability and adaptability for organizations, thus helping supportive integration of the sustainability strategy into appropriate organizational behavior. This paper draws from review of literature on the concepts of sustainability and organizational culture in the present context of economic turmoil. The findings suggest that organizational culture moderated by leadership and trust play an important role in sustainability of organizations. A model is thereby proposed depicting the role of organizational culture, leadership and trust towards sustainability of a firm. It is also suggested that organizations can be visualized as manifestations of cultures and future organizations need to integrate sustainability with their organizational culture in order to be prepared for the uncertain socio-economic times

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Working Papers | 2009

Climate Change Mitigation Potential in South Africa: A National to Sectoral Analysis

Witi Jongikhaya and Chaturvedi Vaibhav

This paper discusses some of the impacts attributed to climate change that are likely to hit Southern Africa as a result of increasing global greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. As South Africa is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions and currently ranked first in Africa, the paper assesses the country.s greenhouse gas emissions profile and possible future projections of emissions and their implications. It then discusses the strategic interventions proposed by South Africa in reducing the gap in emissions between what is required by science and what would happen if development continues at current rates without abating greenhouse gas emissions. Given that the majority of emissions are a result of energy consumption, the paper provides practical solutions to themes such as energy efficiency mostly for the industrial and commercial sectors. With international treaties on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (e.g. Kyoto protocol), there are business opportunities in the area of climate change mitigation. Thus, the paper finally discusses the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) scenario in South Africa and how the country can benefit from other emission trading schemes being practiced in different regions of the world.

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Working Papers | 2009

Computing the probability mass function of the maximum flow through a reliable network

Megha Sharma and Diptesh Ghosh

In this paper we propose a fast state-space enumeration based algorithm called TOP-DOWN capable of computing the probability mass function of the maximum s-t flow through reliable networks. The algorithm computes the probability mass function in the decreasing order of maximum s-t flow values in the network states. This order of enumeration makes this algorithm attractive for commonly observed reliable networks, e.g., in telecommunication networks where link reliabilities are high. We compare the performance of the TOP-DOWN algorithm with a path-based exact algorithm and show that the TOP-DOWN algorithm solves problem much faster and is able to handle much larger problems than existing algorithms.

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Working Papers | 2009

Information System for Brand-Variety Performance and Decisions: Study and Application for Cotton in India

Vasant P. Gandhi

Information on brand-variety performance is critical for small farmers in India since every year they need to make crucial decisions on which brand-variety seeds to plant. The livelihoods from their small farms and returns on all the inputs used depend critically on this decision. Yet no systematic information is available to them on this, and year after year the farmers are forced to decide based on guesses, hearsay and opinions which are frequently imperfect or even biased. Even companies and governments need to know about the actual performance of brand-varieties in different areas so as to be able to recommend correctly. Markedly, on the other hand, official crop-cutting surveys for estimation and assessment of actual yields are a regular feature of all states, and they also record some information regarding the inputs used including the brand-variety. However, the information is never examined from this point of view. Cotton is a major cash crop in India but has substantial problems particularly from extensive pest damage and poor yields. Brand-variety performance varies substantially and poor decisions frequently lead to crop failures and farmer suicides. A study was done on the performance of cotton varieties through a survey across four major Indian states and 694 farmers, covering pest resistance, inputs, yields, quality, price, value of output, cost of cultivation, and profits. This brought out the features and variations, and on this foundation, a brand-variety performance information system is proposed which would draw upon information from the regular crop-cutting surveys, collate it, analyze it, and make findings available to the farmers. This would help provide correct information and advice to farmers over diverse agro-ecological settings. Through this, the farmers would be able to make better informed brand-variety decisions, which would help reduce crop failures and risks and improve farm performance and incomes.

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Working Papers | 2009

Evaluating Downside Risks in Reliable Networks

Megha Sharma and Diptesh Ghosh

Reliable networks are those in which network elements have a positive probability of failing. Conventional performance measures for such networks concern themselves either with expected network performance or with the performance of the network when it is performing well. In reliable networks modeling critical functions, decision makers are often more concerned with network performance when the network is not performing well. In this paper, we study the single-source single-destination maximum flow problem through reliable networks and propose two risk measures to evaluate such downside performance. We propose an algorithm called COMPUTE-RISK to compute downside risk measures, and report our computational experience with the proposed algorithm.

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Working Papers | 2009

Organizing the un-Organized? The Rise, Recession and Revival of the Indian Diamond Industry

Rao Indu

The Indian diamond industry thrives in the atmosphere of secrecy and informality that envelops the diamond trade and has for long been labeled as an unorganized sector of the economy. However, it resembles a close-knit community composed of thousands of small, medium and large sized CPD ( cut and polished diamonds) units and has grown to become one of the highest foreign exchange earners for the country. The industry exports cut and polished diamonds worth US $ 14 billion annually and enjoys a 95 % market share of the global exports of cut and polished diamond pieces. An in-depth study of the industry reveals that the so called unorganized sector is in fact highly organized and has great potential to offer useful insights to the field of management in terms of new forms of organizing, networking, business processing and for doing international business. This paper presents summary of findings from research conducted in the Indian diamond industry over a period of last four years. Part I includes insights about the remarkable rise, growth and the unique working of the industry. Part II makes use of a case study of a 40 years old large- sized CPD unit to help gain further understanding of the Indian diamond industry. Part III is about the impact of the 2008 global turmoil and of the industry's revival after a severe recession. The analysis of findings and implications for future research have been discussed.

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Working Papers | 2009

Encouraging Cooperation in Ad-hoc Mobile-Phone Mesh
Networks for Rural Connectivity

Kavitha Ranganathan and Vikramaditya Shekhar

This paper proposes a rating based scheme for encouraging user participation in ad-hoc mobile phone mesh networks. These networks are particularly attractive for remote/rural areas in developing countries as they do not depend on costly infrastructure and telecom operators. We evaluate our scheme using extensive simulations and find that our proposed scheme is successful in enhancing the network throughput.

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Working Papers | 2009

Analysis of Non Suburban Passenger Coaching Stock Utilization

G. Raghuram, Digar Rishita, and Jain Chandni

In 2007-08, Indian Railways (IR) carried 6.5 billion passengers (highest in the world as a single system, and second highest in the world as a country after Japan at 9.0 billion passengers), serviced 770 billion passenger kms (second highest in the world, close to China at 773 billion passenger kms) and passenger earnings were Rs 19,783 crores. Of this, 43% of the passengers, 84% of the passenger kms and 92% earnings were from the non suburban sector.

The actual passenger kms for 2007-08 was higher than the capacity of the IR. Such overuse can be reduced by increasing the coaching stock, or by improving the utilization of coaches. The former method proves to be an expensive one for IR. Hence, this calls for an improvement in the coaching stock utilization.

In this paper, we assess the utilization of coaches on the parameters % of runtime, kms/day, and average speed of rakes servicing express/mails and passenger trains in the South Central Railway (SCR), taking into consideration the rake linking involved. This is done by analyzing every rake link used in the SCR as given in their rake link booklet.

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