INVITED SESSIONS

Track: GENDER AND INFRASTRUCTURE 

Organizers: Shreyasi Jha and Yamini Mishra  (UN Women)
The proposed track on gender and infrastructure will examine how infrastructure design, planning and provision responds to the different needs of women and affects gender empowerment. Infrastructure affects various dimensions of women’s empowerment and safety. Safe roads and transport facilities for women and girls improves girls’ access to schools and women’s access to social services. Infrastructure improves women’s mobility and access to the voting booths to exercise their political rights and local markets for selling their produce and handicrafts. It also benefits women through saving time and provides convenience through water and sanitation services. Infrastructure also affects women’s safety and security through street lightning and construction of foot-over bridges. There are three panel discussions proposed under this track as follows:

PANEL 1: GENDER EMPOWERMENT THROUGH ICT

Information Communication and Technology plays an important role in gender empowerment and women’s equality. Incorporating gender in ICT projects includes empowering women through capacity building to not only access and use technology, but also to participate in the design, influence content and shape ICT use. This session will focus on the importance of incorporating a gender perspective in ICT policies; access and control; education, training and skill development; and content development. 

PANEL 2: INCORPORATING A GENDER LENS IN URBAN PLANNING AND DESIGN FOR SAFER CITIES

In a study conducted by UN Women and DWCD in 2011, it was reported that public transport, buses and roadsides are spaces where women and girls face highest levels of sexual harassment. While changing the mind-set of people and communities is important, the lack of gender friendly and proper, functional infrastructure like street lights, public transport, roadside toilets also contributes significantly to making cities in India unsafe for women and girls. This panel will discuss (a) how urban service providers can be more responsive to women's safety concerns and create gender sensitive infrastructure and services; and (b) recommendations ensure gender sensitive responses by the civic and urban planners to create safer and more comfortable movement for women and girls. 

PANEL 3: GENDER RESPONSIVE RURAL INFRASTRUCTURE

Very often, women in rural areas have limited access to education, employment, or markets. This limits their opportunity to earn a livelihood and work their way out of poverty. This panel will discuss the gender responsiveness of various schemes introduced by the Government of India to improve rural infrastructure. Specifically, experts will discuss the gender responsiveness of MGNREGA, NRLM and PM Rural Road Scheme. 

INVITED PANELS

PANEL 4: URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND ITS CHALLENGES

High growth of urban population in India is posing a great challenge in various aspects of urban development. The Urban Local Bodies are at the center of managing the fast growing urban population and facing tremendous problems associated with that.  With this background, a Centre of Excellence (CoE) at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore has been conducting studies in various areas since March 2009. The focus has been to address the current problems and come up with appropriate solutions for the Urban Local Bodies and to work with them to use the research result to improve their performance. The three broad heads of the research conducted at the CoE are Institution, Information and Finance. The panel aims to share the research results done on various subjects like Municipal Finance, Urban Administration, Legal Framework, Legislative Reform, and Public Service Delivery.

PANEL 5: ISSUES IN SUB-NATIONAL GOVERNANCE
Organiser: Upinder Sawhney, Panjab University

India's federal form of government provides each State government important functional responsibilities that have the potential to shape inclusive growth. This diversity in sub-national governance provides a rich set of experiences in resource utilization, prioritizing sectors 
of engagement, managing law and order, and providing effective and high quality public services. While some state specific studies exist, surprisingly little of this experience has been in a comparative perspective that captures the richness of India's sub-national experience. This session brings together papers that seek to provide comparative perspectives in sub-national governance.

PANEL 6: ETHICS OF PUBLIC POLICY AND GOVERNANCE—RESPONDING TO CHALLENGES IN THE ERA OF MARKET REFORMS
Organiser: Chiranjib Sen, Azim Premji University

The shift towards greater role of markets has deepened ethical challenges in societies undergoing market reforms. Ethical failures are at the foundation of the evident incapacity of governments and societies to address problems of rising corruption, worsening inequality and marginalization, environmental crisis, laxity of corporate governance and inequitable provision of public services. Norms of public conduct and values that underpin standards of business and government behavior are eroding. In this session, the panel will explore (a) the reasons for the contemporary decline of policy and governance ethics in market-based societies; (b) institutional interventions that would help address these trends; and (c) how public policy and public management education can be improved to deal with ethics in the public domain. 

PANEL 7: INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES
Organiser: Ranjini.C.R, IIMB

There is a huge opportunity as well as a number of challenges in the use of Information and Communication Technologies for socio-economic development. The conceptualization of digital divide moves beyond the lack of ICT hardware. It reflects the differences in opportunities presented to individuals, communities or organizations by ICT and the digital revolution, mainly as a consequence of deficits in access to technologies, capacity to use them and relevant content and applications. Some of the themes that will be explored during this session are information infrastructure, ICTs for development, Health Information Systems and e-Governance.

PANEL 8: GOVERNANCE AT THE CROSS ROADS
Organiser: K Jairaj, IIMB

The image of the Central Government and most State Governments have taken a heavy battering in the wake of the numerous scams and controversies seen in recent times. There is genuine apprehension that the political leadership in this country is bankrupt and does not have the right responses for the current times. Meanwhile, the India growth story has also tapered off and there is pessimism about the future with inflation on the rise. It is now understood that the leakages in the system, in various forms, has assumed monumental dimensions especially in the distribution of subsidy and largess to un-deserving people. Yet, the capacity of the Governments to serve the needs of the people is in doubt. This raises many issues to be addressed by the panel: How do we get our Governance mechanisms right? What do the Central and State Governments need to do to foster economic growth and well being in these troubled times? 

PANEL 9: AFFORDABLE HOUSING: INNOVATIONS IN THE VALUE CHAIN FOR INCLUSIVE GROWTH
Organiser: Venkatesh Panchapagesan and Ramana Tadepalli, IIMB

While the Housing sector in general is linked to various other sectors, the potential for affordable housing to make an impact on the economy in general, and the needy in particular, is immense. The idea of affordability varies across countries/groups and hence serves as a good starting point. In addition, it provides the international context which could be a rich source of learning for all stakeholders. The larger context of demand and supply, especially in the context of urbanization trends as well as the changing demographics, will be the backdrop of the presentations. We will also explore the role of Government, industry as well as Civil Society, in bringing in the required innovations along all possible points in the value chain.

PANEL 10: ENVIRONMENTAL FISCAL REFORMS 
Organiser: Ashish Chaturvedi, GIZ

One of India’s more visible challenge in protecting the environment stems from widespread industrial pollution. This Round-Table brings together scholars and policy-makers engaged in conceptualizing Environmental Fiscal Reforms (EFRs) as a cross-sectoral instrument to manage industrial pollution. The round-table thus proposes to provide a platform for communicating concepts, exchanging experiences, and debating design aspects of EFRs to a wider audience. Design challenges are high as they involve large efficiency and distributional impacts for society and maintaining administrative feasibility. The underlying issues are neither perfectly clear, nor is the political process needed to support it obvious.

PANEL 11: ARCHITECTURE OF INDIAN TAX SYSTEM
Organiser: Monica Singhania, University of Delhi

Income Tax is one of the Central Mission Mode Project under National eGovernance Plan. Under this initiative, Income Tax Department of India is implementing a plan for setting up a comprehensive service that enables citizens to transact all businesses with the Department on an anywhere, anytime basis. Use of information technology as a strategic tool to revolutionize the filing and processing of tax returns in India has a number of social implications for society in addition to achievement of primary objective of increasing income tax collections for the Indian Government. Papers in this panel include: Government Policy towards using Information Technology in Indian Tax System; Strategic Outsourcing by Income Tax Department: PPP Model; National e-Governance Plan and Organisational Transformation: Managing Change.