Research Interests:
  • Primary: International Trade, Innovation, and Development Economics
  • Secondary: Finance

Working Papers: 
  • ​​​War and Reshoring: Evidence from the Russia-Ukraine War of 2022 (with Anindya S Chakrabarti and Avi Dutt)
    • War and violence disrupts trade flows of the country or countries which are engaged in those. But do they also affect the trade patterns of a third country who is not a party, say to the war? We show this indeed happens. Following the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in February 2022 and the resulting sanctions issued by the EU and US, Russia redirected its demand for certain products such as leather, to India who was not directly exposed to the war and the sanction(s). Utilizing monthly firm-destination level information we show that in response to this demand shock, Indian firms redirected or reshored their sales of leather goods from relatively unimportant export destinations such as Oceania, South-east Asia, Africa, Caribbean to Russia while keeping the major destinations -- primarily Europe and the US -- undisturbed. Exports of leather goods from India to Russia went up by 180% -- due to both quantity and price rise. A bulk of this change is driven by the incumbent exporters. This paper, possibly for the first time, presents evidence that war not only affects trade patterns of the countries affected, but also of a third country.
  • Can Globalization Affect Ethnic Politics: Evidence from the Rise in Caste-based Parties in India (with A. Aneja and S. K. Ritadhi)
  • ​​​​Globalization and Domestic Outsourcing (with L. Castro and V.  Tyazhelnikov)​
  • Do Lenders also Respond to Import Competition? Evidence from Bank-Firm Loan Level Data (with S. K. Ritadhi)​​

Paper(s) Under Review:
  • ​Can a Trade Policy Change Increase Gender Equality? New Evidence from Chile (with U. Banerjee and L. Castro) [pdf] Revise & Resubmit (2nd Round) at Journal of International Economics 
    • ​Do firms reorganize gender composition of their employment in response to a trade shock? Using novel data on gender composition of employment across several occupational groups for Chilean manufacturing firms matched with customs data for 1995--2007, a developing country with low gender equality, and utilizing the 1999 Chile-Mexico Free Trade Agreement (FTA) as the quasi-natural shock, we document the first evidence that the share of female white-collar workers increased by 10% for new exporters exporting to Mexico due to the FTA or complete elimination of tariffs. This happened through a substitution effect from male to female high-skilled workers caused primarily due to higher use of technology, high-skilled non-productive tasks, and reduction in discrimination in hiring of female white-collar workers. Our results are driven by domestic firms producing final goods. We also show that re-organization of labour force led to about 14% increase in labour productivity. Overall, we underscore that trade policy can play an important role in addressing gender gap in employment.
  • Import Competition, Knowledge Diffusion, and Innovation (with R. Ahsan) [pdf]
    • ​Successful innovation depends on the stock of knowledge that innovators have access to. Yet, empirical analysis of the impact of trade on innovation abstracts from such knowledge diffusion. We address this gap in the literature by drawing upon the universe of Indian patent applications between 1995 and 2006, which we map to a spatially granular level. We use this original dataset to provide the first evidence of how knowledge diffusion shapes the innovation response of firms facing import competition. We find that, on average, import competition lowers innovation. However, firms that are close to other patenting firms (knowledge access) innovate more: a firm with the 80th percentile knowledge access increases its patents by 3.28% after experiencing a 10% increase in imports. These results suggest that the pre-existing spatial distribution of innovators is an important determinant of how import competition will affect overall innovation.
  • ​Broadband Policy, Adoption of Digital Processes, and Firm Performance: Evidence from China (with W. Zhu) [pdf]
    • ​Do broadband policies affect firm performance? Exploiting a quasi-experimental pilot program, which is a part of a bigger policy design to improve the broadband infrastructure and connectivity, implemented by the Chinese Central Govt. and a novel dataset for Chinese listed firms which provides detailed information of digital processes of firms, we investigate the effect of this policy on firms' adoption of different digital processes, innovation, and other firm level performance for the years 2007-2019. We find that the program increased the digital characteristics of an average Chinese firm located in a city where the policy was implemented, compared to a firm in a city which was not part of the policy, by 31%. We also find significant innovation effects - R&D expenditure and patent filings went up by 27% and 22%, respectively. All these led to increase in sales and value-added by 15% and stock-market valuation by 16%. Overall, our results underscore that broadband is a important factor for improved firm performance, especially in emerging economies.
  • Trade Reform, M&A Activity, and Family Firms (with H. Yang) [pdf]
    • ​We estimate the effect of trade liberalization, especially the role of foreign or product market competition, on domestic vertical M&As of the Indian manufacturing firms. We find that higher degree of product market competition, or a 10% drop in output tariffs reduces the probability of engaging into a domestic M&A by 0.16 or 16%. However, our results show substantial heterogeneity when dividing firms by their ownership: family-owned and others: family firms' probability of investments for  domestic vertical M&A increases by 14-35%. This effect is completely driven by those firms (family-owned) which are between 20–80th percentile with no effect on firms below and at the very top of the family ownership distribution. We find indicative evidences that higher leverage (financial) and risk taking attitudes play a critical role in explaining such differential behaviour for family firms. Our results highlight one important point, both from theoretical and empirical perspective, how a firm's ownership influences its reorganization while competing with external forces.
  • Bank Entry, New Loans, and Misallocation (with N. Mitra) [pdf]
    • ​Can the introduction of new banks reduce misallocation? Using a unique firm-bank matched data on credit relations for manufacturing firms in India and exploiting a policy change that mandated the introduction of new private banks (domestic and foreign), we find that the presence of the new banks has a negligible effect on between-firm allocation of resources. The new banks cherry-pick big firms for credit lending. Easier access to credit reduces the capital market distortions for those big firms by 11%, while at the same time marginally increasing the distortions in other input and product markets. Reduction in credit market distortions results in higher investments and an increase in within-firm or physical productivity. Lastly, a counterfactual exercise shows that the new banks account for at least a 5-7% gain in aggregate manufacturing productivity.
​
Publications: 
Journal Articles:
  • Chinese Import Competition and Prices: Evidence from India (with M. Henry and R. Singh)
    • ​Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics 86(6): 1484-1510, 2024 [pdf]
  • Import Competition, Formalization, and the Role of Contract Labor (with R. Singh and V. Soundararajan)
    • ​The World Bank Economic Review 38 (4): 708-740, 2024 [pdf]
  • Import Competition, Labour Regulations, and Firm Outsourcing (with D.  Mitra and A. Sundaram)
    • Journal of Development Economics 168: 103272, 2024 [pdf]
  • Bank Ownership and Firm Performance
    • Economica 91 (361): 238-267, 2024 [pdf]
  • Cross-border Environmental Regulation and Firm Labor Demand (with A. Chakrabarti and C. Chatterjee)
    • Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 117: 102753, 2023 [pdf]
  • Intellectual Property Regimes and Wage Inequality (with S. Bhattacharya and  C. Chatterjee)
    • ​Journal of Development Economics 154: 102709, 2022  [pdf]
  • Chinese Competition and Product Variety of Indian firms (with M. Henry) 
    • Journal of Comparative Economics 47 (2): 367-395, 2019 [pdf]
  • Input-trade Liberalization and the Demand for Managers: Evidence from India (with O. Raveh)
    • ​​Journal of International Economics 111: 159-176, 2018 [pdf]
  • The Great Trade Collapse and Indian Firms
    • ​​World Economy 41 (1): 100-125, 2018 [pdf]
  • Environmental Standards, Trade and Innovation: Evidence from a Natural Experiment
    • Environment and Development Economics 22 (4): 414-446, 2017 [pdf]
  • ​Does Environmental Regulation Indirectly Induce Upstream Innovation? New Evidence from India (with C. Chatterjee) 
    • Research Policy 46 (5): 939-955, 2017 [pdf]
      • Top three 2017 articles w/the most social media attention @ResearchPolicy  
  • Judicial Quality and Regional Firm Performance: The Case of Indian States 
    • Journal of Comparative Economics ​44 (4): 902-918, 2016 [pdf]
  • Does Openness Affect Inequality? A Case Study for India (with A. Barua) 
    • Review of Development Economics 14 (3): 447-465, 2010 [pdf]
​​Chapters in Books:
  • Trade Reform, Managers, and Skill Intensity: Evidence from India [pdf]
    • in M. Bacchetta and M. Helble (eds.), Trade Adjustment in Asia: Past Experiences and Lessons Learned, pp. 229-275, 2019
  • Trade and Industrial Performance since the WTO Reforms: What Indian Evidences Suggest? (with A. Barua and D. Chakraborty) [pdf] 
    • in R. M. Stern and A. Barua (eds.), India and the WTO: Issues and Negotiating Strategies, pp. 121-144, 2010 
  • Environmental Service Negotiation and India: Priorities and Concerns (with O. De) [pdf]
    • in B. DebRoy et al. (eds.) the trade game: negotiation trends at WTO and concerns of developing countries, pp. 203-214,  2006
Future Research:
  • GST, Inputs Use, and Quality Upgrading (with Yogeshwar Bharat)
  • R&D Tax Credit and Firm Performance: Evidence from a Quasi-natural Experiment (with S. Sircar, R. Verma, and S. Mathur)
  • Creditor Rights, Bank Lending, and Product Variety (with V. Tyazhelnikov)
  • Cotton and Conflict: How the U.S. Civil War Revolutionized India's Industrial and Social Hierarchy (with U. Banerjee)
  • TBTs and Product-Input Choice (with A. de Pirro)
  • Does Gender Reform Affect Financial Behaviour of Firms? New Evidence from India (with S. Banerjee and U. Banerjee)​