India Schools

It’s just coincidence but today, as a statement from several big microfinance networks including FINCA, Opportunity International and WWB (lead by UNITUS) that (dis)engaged with the research results of CMF and other research entities was launched, I finally figured out how to convert Professor Esther Duflo’s seminar on Spandana last July at IFMR from cassette audio to CD to MP3 and set it to her powerpoint presentation. There will be more commentary on the aforementioned practitioner response but for now, enjoy the video streams and the juxtaposition.

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The Impact of our Impact Evaluation

While much has been written about research results on the impact of microfinance products (including the Centre for Micro Finance’s study on the impact of Spandana’s micro-credit expansion ), less is known about the effects of microfinance’s mechanisms. For instance, what are some of the effects of microfinance’s unique features of group loan disbursement and group repayment? Groups typically meet once a week, like this video below from MicroSave’s excellent videocast series, to repay chunks of their loan.

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Getting a Handle on the Intangibles: Microfinance and Social Capital

Last evening in Chennai , I noticed something interesting. I was waiting at the service centre for my recently purchased speaker system to be fixed. A maintenance man was repairing the AC

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The Indian Culture of Repair: Implications for Product Design & Adoption in the Market

Caste, a uniquely Indian social institution has been a central influence on the lives of Indians and their communities for millennia. A complex, heterogenous system of community relations (or non-relations) with obscure origins, it has dogged the Republican Indian state and modern Indian society in one way or another.

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The three roles of caste in Indian society

Sedbergh School filed the Canadian equivalent of a US chapter 7 bankruptcy, a “notice of intention,” which will allow the school to complete the current school year followed by an orderly unwinding of affairs and settling of its debt burden. It’s very sad news.

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A Canadian Boarding School Cousin to Close

With the boarding school basketball season finished, we’ve come across a couple of highlights that provide an interesting picture of the intensely competitive Boys Class A level. Class A basketball hosts an unusual combination of athleticism and academic preparation

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Both Sides of the Prep School Basketball Coin: Athletics and Academics Boys Class A Basketball Concludes

Corporation Bank invites Online Applications for recruitment to the posts of Probationary Officer and Specialist Officers in Management Grade. Online Application between March 18, 2010 and April 08, 2010. Exam for Probationary Officer On May 09, 2010.

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Corporation Bank Recruitment 2010: Probationary, Specialist Officers

(Blog by Abhay Agarwal) Lead Presenter: Mr. Chuck Waterfield, CEO & President, MFTransparency Ms. Achla Savyasaachi, Vice President, Sa-Dhan Discussants: Mr

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LIVE BLOGGING: Sa Dhan Conference- Session VII- Responsible microfinance: Need for self regulating the practice

Chair: Mr. Jyotiraditya Scindia, Hon’able Minister of State for Commerce and Industry, Govt of India Presentations: Ms.

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LIVE BLOGGING: Sa Dhan Conference- Session V: Linking Financial inclusion with sustainable livelihoods

(Blog by Abhay Agarwal) The session started with a speech by Salman Khurshid – Minister of Corporate and Minority Affairs, Government of India. He talked about the availability of credit, which is a lot more important than cost of credit.

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LIVE BLOGGING: Sa Dhan Conference: Special Session: Challenges of inclusion and the role of democracy

It’s been considered in United States that a high percentage of this remarkable Rhodes Scholars are considered as these boarding school alumni. In each year, this Rhodes Trust awards for over 80 educational scholarships around the globe and 32 of this will go to the U.S.

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Production of High Concentrations of this Rhodes Scholars

Mr. Nandan Nilekani, Chairman- Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) Mr. Nilekani started his speech by stating his belief that UID and financial inclusion are very much inter connected.

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LIVE BLOGGING: Sa-Dhan Conference: Special Session: Financial Inclusion and role of Unique Identification Number (UID)

Charter schools — a cornerstone of the Obama administration’s education strategy — are facing resistance across the country, as they become more popular and as traditional public schools compete for money. The education scholar Diane Ravitch, once a booster of the movement, is now an outspoken critic. What is causing the push-back on charter schools, beyond the local issues involved ?

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The Push-Back on Charter Schools

A spate of reforms in the field of education, some of them already implemented and some awaiting implementation, have brought the subject of education into the focus of public debate. These include the abolition of examinations at the Class X level, the unification of syllabi of higher secondary courses and the introduction of a national common entrance examination. Moves towards public-private-partnership in education, the legislation on the Right to Education, the proposal to create a National Commission for Higher Education and Research (NCHER), and steps towards compulsory accreditation, foreign direct investment and prevention of unfair practices also come in the same genre.

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Erosion of federal space in education

The textile exporters of Tirupur (Tamilnadu) have reasons to believe that the pollution tag associated with the local industry will be washed away; the shareholders of Suzlon Inc are laughing their way to the banks and the forest department in Goa gears up for large scale forestry operations. All the three entities are independent of each other, but what is common to them is that directly or indirectly their operations have affected the local environment. And all three of them have found mention (and fund allocation) in the union budget 2010.

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Union Budget 2010: Controlling the dirty and promoting the green

At the outset of financial crisis (in 2008) the major concern had been about liquidity squeeze, with fears that MFIs would be unable to roll over their debt. In large part the sector avoided this fate, as the credit market serving MFIs recovered quickly and microfinance investors remained committed to the asset class. CGAP and J.P.

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MFI – All Eyes on Asset Quality

The recently constructed Economic Environment Index (EEI) by the Centre for Development Finance, IFMR ranks Madurai at the 23rd position among the districts of Tamil Nadu. Madurai’s rank on the EEI is often compared to its rank on banking indicators such as per 1000 population bank credit and bank deposit on which it ranks 2nd and 3rd in the state.

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Understanding the Economic Environment Index

A newly published CGAP Focus Note highlights the potential for microfinance repayment crises in emerging markets, with particular focus on recent crises in Pakistan, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Morocco, and Nicaragua. India has been no stranger to repayment crises, arising sporadically in high-penetration pockets of the country–the Andhra Pradesh crisis of 2006 and the Kolar and less well-known Kanpur crises of last year.

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Crisis Conjecturing

The National Law School of India Review (NLSIR) , the flagship journal of the National Law School of India University, Bangalore, will be hosting the 3 rd Annual NLSIR Symposium, ‘Indian Corporate Law and Corporate Governance: At the Crossroads’, in Bangalore, on 10 th and 11 th April, 2010. Extracts from the concept note for the Symposium may be of interest to our readers

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Event Announcement: 3rd NLSIR Symposium on Corporate Governance

A recurring theme on this blog has been the connections and disconnects between English speaking and ‘vernacular’ India . The recent expansion in Indian language news channels and media , preceded by the expansion in the Indian language newspaper market has brought television to the fore, as a powerful new force in the evolving Indian society

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Indian language news channels and the expansion of democratic space