Shreekant Iyengar | SVKM NMIMS (original) (raw)
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Papers by Shreekant Iyengar
The Iup Journal of Financial Economics, Sep 1, 2010
Sovereign credit ratings provided by international rating agencies to different countries have a ... more Sovereign credit ratings provided by international rating agencies to different countries have a definite impact on their access to the international credit market. These ratings help to develop lenders’ perception about the level of credit risk of the national governments. However, the reliability of the ratings has been a matter of debate due to the methodology followed by the agencies. The present paper attempts to check the reliability of these ratings, by considering the ratings assigned by two of the major international rating agencies—Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s. This is done through comparison of the ratings assigned by them and checking whether the difference is significant and responsive for the countries rated by both. A regression analysis of the ratings and some of the commonly used indicators by the two agencies to determine the ratings, is also done. The results indicate an increase in the average rating difference of the two agencies over time and that the difference is statistically significant. Moreover, the rating methodology followed by these agencies involves several common indicators, except the external balances indicator. The differences in the ratings, however, are also caused due to subjective assessments of the countries by the rating agencies.
Review of Market Integration, 2012
The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasises the wider and better coverage of services, such as pr... more The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasises the wider and better coverage of services, such as primary healthcare for the majority of population. For this purpose, various healthcare related programmes have aimed at the vulnerable sections of the society traditionally using social criteria like Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) populations. Although they are found to have marginally worse health outcomes than the national average, they are far better than the one’s for the poor on economic criteria. The present article examines the coverage of basic primary healthcare services among the below the poverty line (BPL) population in rural areas of India and provides direct empirical evidence. Data used for the study was from a primary sample survey of rural BPL households in six states of India. The results of the survey showed that the coverage of primary healthcare services, such as ante-natal care (ANC), institutional deliveries, and immunisation was very low among the ...
The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due t... more The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due to their ineffective access to the basic services like primary education needs to be tested against the evidence. Traditionally identified weaker section on social criteria (SC and ST population) seems to have a similar or relatively better access to the primary education. However, there is no direct evidence available for the weaker section on the economic criteria or the population living below poverty line (BPL). The present paper attempts to provide an empirical evidence for the premise of the Planning Commission from the household survey of BPL families in five states of India including the survey of primary schools for the same states and localities. Our findings suggest that there is a problem of access of the poor (BPL) households to the primary education services in rural areas. Primary enrolment ratios among the children of poor households are considerably lower than the respect...
The present study attempts to examine the role of specialist services in rural public health syst... more The present study attempts to examine the role of specialist services in rural public health system of India in the areas of maternal and child healthcare. The study uses primary data collected through a survey of doctors and paramedical staff working at public health facilities regarding availability and quality of the specialist services in gynaecology, paediatrics and anaesthesia. The study discusses in detail the aspects of infrastructure, manpower and operational challenges faced in effective provisioning of specialist services through the rural health facilities of four largest states – Bihar, Madhya Pradesh (MP), Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh (UP). The findings of the survey reveal significant dearth of specialist doctors with their concentration at the district level. Moreover, there are severe misallocations of the specialist doctors and, lack of manpower support, equipment and basic infrastructure within the public health system causing serious challenges in effective provis...
Vikalpa: The Journal for Decision Makers, 2012
Sovereign credit ratings estimate the future ability and willingness of the sovereign governments... more Sovereign credit ratings estimate the future ability and willingness of the sovereign governments to service their commercial and financial obligations in full and on time. The process of evaluating the nations and assigning ratings is a business involving various international rating agencies. Governments seek the credit ratings so as to improve their access to the international capital markets. The sovereign credit ratings are an important scale for determining the cost of borrowing to a country. The ratings provide a perception to the lenders about the level of credit risk of the national governments. However, the reliability of the ratings has been a matter of debate in the past due to the methodology followed by the rating agencies.
Health performance of Gujarat viewed in terms of the Human Development Index (HDI) portrays it as... more Health performance of Gujarat viewed in terms of the Human Development Index (HDI) portrays it as a medium performer in the country. However, the index of health component for Gujarat is found to be positively contributing to the HDI ranking of the state. It is, therefore, crucial to review the status of health performance of Gujarat among the other states for improving its relative standing in human development. In this context the present paper attempts to identify the gaps in performance of the health related outcome, output and input indicators from the best performers in each indicator. Moreover, the paper also reviews the trends in health performance of Gujarat over time and also estimates the effectiveness of the state in converting its health inputs to outputs and outputs to outcomes. The results indicate that the outcome indicators have improved in the absolute sense but have high performance gaps except the maternal mortality rate (MMR). Majority of the output and input indicators, however, show poor absolute performance and high performance gaps that have been expanding over time. The effectiveness of conversion of health indicators in Gujarat suggests that while the state has moved above average in conversion of outputs into outcomes, it has moved at a slightly below average level in converting its inputs to outputs over time. Improving the health status of Gujarat requires targeted efforts in specific areas such as controlling neo-natal deaths, improving coverage of children under immunization and address malnourishment. Additionally, building adequate health infrastructure and employing required manpower are also relevant.
The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due t... more The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due to their ineffective access to the basic services like primary education needs to be tested against the evidence. Traditionally identified weaker section on social criteria (SC and ST population) seems to have a similar or relatively better access to the primary education. However, there is
The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasizes the wider and better coverage of services, such as pr... more The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasizes the wider and better coverage of services, such as primary healthcare for the majority of population. For this purpose, various healthcare related programmes have aimed at the vulnerable sections of the society traditionally using social criteria like SC and ST populations. Although they are found to have marginally worse health outcomes than the
The Iup Journal of Financial Economics, Sep 1, 2010
Sovereign credit ratings provided by international rating agencies to different countries have a ... more Sovereign credit ratings provided by international rating agencies to different countries have a definite impact on their access to the international credit market. These ratings help to develop lenders’ perception about the level of credit risk of the national governments. However, the reliability of the ratings has been a matter of debate due to the methodology followed by the agencies. The present paper attempts to check the reliability of these ratings, by considering the ratings assigned by two of the major international rating agencies—Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s. This is done through comparison of the ratings assigned by them and checking whether the difference is significant and responsive for the countries rated by both. A regression analysis of the ratings and some of the commonly used indicators by the two agencies to determine the ratings, is also done. The results indicate an increase in the average rating difference of the two agencies over time and that the difference is statistically significant. Moreover, the rating methodology followed by these agencies involves several common indicators, except the external balances indicator. The differences in the ratings, however, are also caused due to subjective assessments of the countries by the rating agencies.
Review of Market Integration, 2012
The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasises the wider and better coverage of services, such as pr... more The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasises the wider and better coverage of services, such as primary healthcare for the majority of population. For this purpose, various healthcare related programmes have aimed at the vulnerable sections of the society traditionally using social criteria like Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) populations. Although they are found to have marginally worse health outcomes than the national average, they are far better than the one’s for the poor on economic criteria. The present article examines the coverage of basic primary healthcare services among the below the poverty line (BPL) population in rural areas of India and provides direct empirical evidence. Data used for the study was from a primary sample survey of rural BPL households in six states of India. The results of the survey showed that the coverage of primary healthcare services, such as ante-natal care (ANC), institutional deliveries, and immunisation was very low among the ...
The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due t... more The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due to their ineffective access to the basic services like primary education needs to be tested against the evidence. Traditionally identified weaker section on social criteria (SC and ST population) seems to have a similar or relatively better access to the primary education. However, there is no direct evidence available for the weaker section on the economic criteria or the population living below poverty line (BPL). The present paper attempts to provide an empirical evidence for the premise of the Planning Commission from the household survey of BPL families in five states of India including the survey of primary schools for the same states and localities. Our findings suggest that there is a problem of access of the poor (BPL) households to the primary education services in rural areas. Primary enrolment ratios among the children of poor households are considerably lower than the respect...
The present study attempts to examine the role of specialist services in rural public health syst... more The present study attempts to examine the role of specialist services in rural public health system of India in the areas of maternal and child healthcare. The study uses primary data collected through a survey of doctors and paramedical staff working at public health facilities regarding availability and quality of the specialist services in gynaecology, paediatrics and anaesthesia. The study discusses in detail the aspects of infrastructure, manpower and operational challenges faced in effective provisioning of specialist services through the rural health facilities of four largest states – Bihar, Madhya Pradesh (MP), Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh (UP). The findings of the survey reveal significant dearth of specialist doctors with their concentration at the district level. Moreover, there are severe misallocations of the specialist doctors and, lack of manpower support, equipment and basic infrastructure within the public health system causing serious challenges in effective provis...
Vikalpa: The Journal for Decision Makers, 2012
Sovereign credit ratings estimate the future ability and willingness of the sovereign governments... more Sovereign credit ratings estimate the future ability and willingness of the sovereign governments to service their commercial and financial obligations in full and on time. The process of evaluating the nations and assigning ratings is a business involving various international rating agencies. Governments seek the credit ratings so as to improve their access to the international capital markets. The sovereign credit ratings are an important scale for determining the cost of borrowing to a country. The ratings provide a perception to the lenders about the level of credit risk of the national governments. However, the reliability of the ratings has been a matter of debate in the past due to the methodology followed by the rating agencies.
Health performance of Gujarat viewed in terms of the Human Development Index (HDI) portrays it as... more Health performance of Gujarat viewed in terms of the Human Development Index (HDI) portrays it as a medium performer in the country. However, the index of health component for Gujarat is found to be positively contributing to the HDI ranking of the state. It is, therefore, crucial to review the status of health performance of Gujarat among the other states for improving its relative standing in human development. In this context the present paper attempts to identify the gaps in performance of the health related outcome, output and input indicators from the best performers in each indicator. Moreover, the paper also reviews the trends in health performance of Gujarat over time and also estimates the effectiveness of the state in converting its health inputs to outputs and outputs to outcomes. The results indicate that the outcome indicators have improved in the absolute sense but have high performance gaps except the maternal mortality rate (MMR). Majority of the output and input indicators, however, show poor absolute performance and high performance gaps that have been expanding over time. The effectiveness of conversion of health indicators in Gujarat suggests that while the state has moved above average in conversion of outputs into outcomes, it has moved at a slightly below average level in converting its inputs to outputs over time. Improving the health status of Gujarat requires targeted efforts in specific areas such as controlling neo-natal deaths, improving coverage of children under immunization and address malnourishment. Additionally, building adequate health infrastructure and employing required manpower are also relevant.
The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due t... more The Planning Commission’s premise that the growth in India has bypassed the weaker sections due to their ineffective access to the basic services like primary education needs to be tested against the evidence. Traditionally identified weaker section on social criteria (SC and ST population) seems to have a similar or relatively better access to the primary education. However, there is
The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasizes the wider and better coverage of services, such as pr... more The 11th Five-Year Plan of India emphasizes the wider and better coverage of services, such as primary healthcare for the majority of population. For this purpose, various healthcare related programmes have aimed at the vulnerable sections of the society traditionally using social criteria like SC and ST populations. Although they are found to have marginally worse health outcomes than the