Courses & Events
#TheIndiaDialog Conversation: Understanding Black Economy in India
Thursday, May 30, 2024
08:00 am - 09:00 am
Monthly online seminar series hosted by US-ATMC Director Dr. Richard Dasher and the Institute for Competitiveness’ Honorary Chairman Dr. Amit Kapoor. Guest speakers are invited to share their perspective on India’s development and its challenges. This series is a continuation of The India Dialog summit, an annual conference that addresses the transformations of India’s economic and social landscape. Visit our India Dialog page for more information.
Details
Zoom Seminar:
- 8:00 AM – 9:00 AM Pacific Time
- 8:30 PM – 9:30 PM India Time
Registration: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_l6v-ldmJRTqpNVsZ5qCHqA#/registration
This will register you for the entire monthly series and the same link will be used for all sessions. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting series. You may cancel at anytime.
Speakers
Prof. Arun Kumar
Retd. Prof of Economics, Jawaharlal Nehru Univ New Delhi, India
Arun Kumar, joined JNU in 1984 and retired as the Sukhamoy Chakravarty Chair Professor in the Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University in 2015. In 2022, he Chaired the Commission on Unemployment set up by Civil Society Groups. He was President of JNU Teachers’ Association for 2014. He has been the Vice President and Acting President of Indian Academy of Social Sciences.
He has a Ph.D. in Economics from JNU and a Masters in Physics from both Princeton University USA and Delhi University. He is a gold medalist of Delhi Higher Secondary Board and Delhi University. He has specialized in Development Economics, Public Finance and Public Policy. He was in National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (1982-85) working on the Report on the black economy in India for CBDT, GoI.
He has had visiting assignments in Pavia University, Italy and Humboldt and Leipzig Universities, Germany. He has delivered lectures at Yale Univ., Columbia Univ. and Carnegie Mellon Univ. in USA and UNAM, Mexico. UNAM, Mexico awarded him the Ricardo Prize in Economics for his work in Development Economics.
His Ph.D. thesis (1982) on Inflation and Terms of Trade gave a new understanding of the role of trade and government in inflation in India. His book ‘The Black Economy in India’, published by Penguin (1999, 2002 and 2017) has broken new ground in thinking about the Indian Economy. He edited the book, ‘Challenges Facing Indian Universities’ (2004) and has written extensively on issues pertaining to Higher Education in India.
He published, ‘Indian Economy since Independence: Persisting Colonial Disruption’, (2013), ‘Understanding Black Economy and Black Money in India: An Enquiry into Causes, Consequences and Remedies’, Feb., 2017, ‘Demonetization and the Black Economy’, December 2017, ‘Ground Scorching Tax’, analyzing GST, February 2019 and ‘Indian Economy’s Greatest Crisis: Impact of the Coronavirus and the Road Ahead’, December 2020. The last three books are published by Penguin Random House.
He has written extensively on globalization, development and on issues of public policy both in academic journals and in the popular press and contributed to public discussions on policy since 1980. He was the Vice Chair of the manifesto drafting committee of National Front in 1989 and the Convener of the Economics & Ecology Committee of AAP in 2013.
He authored the Alternative Budgets for 1993-94 and 1994-95 which proposed alternative economic policies for the country. These were presented before a Citizen’s Assembly of eminent citizens of the country. He was a part of a Group producing the Alternative Economic Survey for 2 decades which provided an alternative analysis of the official data. He was the group leader of the Indo Russian Committee for the pricing of SU30 MKI. He was a member of the First Pay Commission of the Tibetan Government in Exile. He has participated in various social movements from time to time, like, on Housing Rights.
