If one were to look at the CMF Publications list, especially the factsheets, one would find a factsheet pertaining to the topic mentioned above. We at CMF will be focusing on this topic: Agricultural Financing exclusively over the next two … Read More

To my mind, the biggest challenge of social science research using survey data is reconciling the rigours of mathematical analysis with the gymnastics of developing intuitive inferences about the nature and dynamics of everyday social reality. Few things illustrate this … Read More

Saving has lately been recognized as an inevitable instrument of financial inclusion. But this financial behaviour needs to be judicious as undisciplined saving traps people in the vicious circle of poverty that results in accumulated debt. For low-income households, situations … Read More

This is the inspiring story of an ordinary housewife who rose above her position and succeeded in making her life worthwhile. Hailing from Narpatpur, Varanasi, Gita Devi was just another regular housewife whose job description included looking after her family … Read More

An interview with  Mrs. Usha Thorat, Director, CAFRAL. In  this  issue, we get to know more about  CAFRAL’s aspirations and future plans in the area of Financial Research. Usha Thorat, former Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India, took over  as … Read More

It is estimated that more than half of the Indian labor force is engaged in agriculture.  Given this, India’s productivity in agriculture is still quite low.  For example, India is the second largest producer of cotton in the world, after … Read More

My first blog post from Satara was a basic introduction to our project on long term savings and the second was about some preliminary results from our baseline data. This post is not technically about the project but is more … Read More

“Every handicraft has to be taught not merely mechanically as is done today, but scientifically. This is to say, the child should learn the why and wherefore of every process.” – Gandhi’s Philosophy of Education     The greatest challenge in … Read More

India is a hot bed of financial exclusion. A country which houses nearly 16% of the global population  has more than 65% of its people outside the formal financial system (Global Findex 2012). The Indian banking system has adopted multiple … Read More