Professor Nishith Prakash was recently awarded a Faculty Large Grant by the Office of the Vice President for Research for his proposal entitled Affirmative Action, Public Service Delivery and Well-Being in India. Below please find the abstract for this project.

The world’s biggest and arguably most aggressive form of affirmative action policy in employment exists in India, where government jobs are explicitly reserved for historically disadvantaged minority groups. In this research project, we aim to study the impact of employment quotas for “Other Backward Classes” (OBCs) mandated by the Mandal Commission on public service delivery and well-being. The Mandal Commission reserved approximately 27% of government jobs for OBCs. The specific outcomes we examine include implementation of government sponsored schemes, provision of public infrastructure, mobility, and education, health and employment outcomes. We are not aware of any existing study that rigorously quantifies the effects of any aspect of the Mandal Commission.

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