India and Cash Transfers https://carnegieindia.org/2018/02/14/india-and-cash-transfers-pub-75503
A UBI in India not only would reimagine the social contract between 1.3 billion citizens and their state but also could provide a blueprint for every other low- and middle-income country wanting to take the plunge.
Published February 14, 2018
the well-theorized path to economic growth for emerging economies involved building a large, labor-intensive manufacturing sector that would grow more productive. This, in turn, would drive economy-wide industrialization and would hasten an eventual transition to a service economy. this relationship has broken down in recent years, a trend he labels “premature deindustrialization.
If Indian policymakers fail either to create opportunities for unskilled labor or to equip future entrants into the labor force with the education required for high-skill employment, calls for a drastic expansion of the country’s social safety net will likely increase.
India’s contemporary interest in a UBI has emerged from a far more recent debate among the country’s development policymakers on whether direct cash transfers deliver benefits and alleviate poverty more efficiently than in-kind transfer programs like the public distribution system (PDS) or the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA).