The State Capacity Initiative at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR), the National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), the Forum of Indian Regulators (FOIR), and the Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs (IICA) are pleased to invite you to the first event of the Know Your Regulator Series: Why you should ‘Know your Regulator’?
About the ‘Know Your Regulator’ Series
Speaker: Dr M. S. Sahoo, Chairperson, Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI) and Honorary Chairperson, Forum of Indian Regulators (FOIR)
In conversation with:
Dr KP Krishnan, IEPF Chair Professor in Regulatory Economics, NCAER
Dr Mekhala Krishnamurthy, Senior Fellow, CPR and Director, State Capacity Initiative.
The event summary can be accessed here.
The State Capacity Initiative at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR), the National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), the Forum of Indian Regulators (FOIR) and the Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs (IICA) are pleased to announce a new talk series titled: ‘Know Your Regulator’ In this series, we will talk to the people entrusted with the task of regulating Indian markets and various parts and aspects of the economy. These are the chairpersons and members of India’s regulatory agencies.
In our conversations, we will seek to explore the public nature of regulatory activity. In other words, why should the work of regulatory agencies be of interest to people, as producers, consumers, professionals, service providers, and as citizens? What are the public goals of regulation? In what ways does the work of regulation involve having to make a balance, or to make trade-offs, or to amicably resolve competing or even conflicting claims of public and private interest?
Regulatory agencies are a relatively recent innovation of the Indian state, set up to address the evolving needs of the Indian economy in the decades since the 1990s (although with some notable older instances). We are interested in exploring the institutional form of the regulatory agencies, their features, norms and values, and their frameworks of decision-making and rationality. We are also interested in the functional domain and the everyday administration of the regulatory agencies, their staffing, procedures, information systems and operational modalities.
Regulatory agencies are envisaged as a state agency that can respond to complex and changing situations, both at the level of policy recommendation and in case-specific ruling. In the conception of regulatory agencies, this was thought of as a challenge that would be addressed through specialisation, expertise and in the design of their power and functions. However, each regulatory agency is also unique, in terms of the way in which its regulatory mandate is designed and the nature of the challenges that it is set up to address. In this talk series, we will seek to explore the regulatory debates (both broad and sectoral) that animate the world of regulation, and how it relates to the rest of us.
Detailed programme
5:30 PM Welcome Note Yamini Aiyar,
5:40 PM ‘Regulating in the public interest’ Dr Abha Yadav, Arkaja Singh
5:50 PM Why should you ‘Know Your Regulator?’ Dr. MS Sahoo,
Dr KP Krishnan, Dr Mekhala Krishnamurthy
6:30 PM Questions & Answers
About the Institutions
The Forum of Indian Regulators (FOIR) was established as a registered society in 2000, with the purpose of providing a common platform for the members of Indian regulatory agencies to discuss emerging issues in regulatory procedure and practice, to evolve common strategies, and to share information and experiences. It aims to promote the growth and development of independent regulatory bodies. FOIR currently has 37 members, including the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), Airports Economic Regulatory Authority of India (AERA), Competition Commission of India (CCI), Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI), Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB), Tariff Authority for Major Ports (TAMP), Warehousing Development & Regulatory Authority (WDRA), Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) and 29 State Electricity Regulatory Commissions.
The Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs (IICA) is a subordinate office under the Ministry of Corporate Affairs of Government of India, handling and dealing with various subjects, matters and affairs in the arena and spectrum of corporate affairs regulation, governance and policy. It was established in 2008 at Manesar, Haryana. The Ministry of Corporate Affairs in India had established the Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs (IICA) to function as a think tank, action research, service delivery and capacity building support to the Ministry, corporate sector, professionals and related stakeholders. In the IICA we teach praxis by relying on the IICA Way of Learning. Praxis for IICA is not a product, but a process that evolves through the learners’ own practices, experiments, contradictions and failures. We believe that leaders learn to create ways of pattern recognition as they progress along the pathway of leadership.
The National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER) is India’s oldest and largest independent, non-profit, economic policy research institute. Established in 1956 as a public-private partnership, NCAER was funded by both the government and private industry. NCAER’s work falls into four thematic areas: (1) Growth, Macro, Trade, and Economic Policy; (2) Investment Climate, Industry, Infrastructure, Labour, and Urban; (3) Agriculture and Rural Development, Natural Resources, and Environment; and (4) Poverty, Equity, Human Development, and Consumers. The focus of NCAER’s work in these areas is on generating and analysing empirical evidence to support and inform policy choices.
The State Capacity Initiative at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) The State Capacity Initiative at CPR is an interdisciplinary research and practice programme focused on addressing the challenges of the 21st-century Indian state. The purpose of this initiative is to place the critical challenges of building state capacity at the heart of the field of policy research in India, where it has always belonged but remains surprisingly marginalised. We, therefore, start with first principles and ground ourselves in existing realities to deepen and expand the understanding of the challenges and possibilities of building state capacity in democratic and federal India. Our programme of work focuses on the changing roles of the Indian state; institutional design, implementation and administrative capacity especially at the state-level; the particular challenges of regulatory and fiscal capacity; and the complex and changing relations between society, politics and state capacity in India. The Initiative works across sectors and states to identify and address a number of critical, cross- cutting/ transversal issues and is both interdisciplinary and comparative in its approach, learning as deeply, broadly, rigorously and responsively as required.
