Students
Past and Present
The list of alumni of the Economics Department reads like a veritable Who’s Who. Many of its alumni have achieved international renown in the academic world. Although Amartya Kumar Sen, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1998, is possibly the most well-known alumni, others like Bhabatosh Dutta, Sukhamoy Chakrabarty, Mihir Rakshit, Amiya Bagchi, Amit Bhaduri, Pranab Bardhan, Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee, Debraj Ray, Sugata Marjit and Maitreesh Ghatak, to name only a few, have become stalwarts in the academic field. In 2018, Maitreesh Ghatak was voted as Fellow of the British Academy.
The Centre for Economic Studies also attracted many young economists who later rose to prominence in the academic world. Among the early Fellows was the late Amaresh Bagchi, who later became Director of the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, and Sir Partha Dasgupta, currently the Frank Ramsey Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Cambridge. Among other fellows of the Centre were Abhirup Sarkar, Susmita Rashitt, Asis Banerjee, Ramprasad Sengupta, Bibek Debroy and Pranab Kumar Basu.
Simultaneously, many ex-students of the Department have risen to prominence and hold leadership positions in the domain of policy making. Sukhamoy Chakrabarty was an important member of the Planning Commission during the 1970s, and subsequently prepared a review of monetary and credit policy in India in the late 1980s. Not many Departments can boast of having two Governors of Reserve Bank of India among its former students—Bimal Jalan and Nirmalchandra Sengupta. Prof. Mihir Rakshit was a member of the Board of Directors in Reserve Bank of India. Bhabatosh Datta was member of the Fourth Finance Commission and also served in The World Bank. Another alumnus, Isher Judge Ahluwalia, was Chairperson, Board of Trustees of the International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington D.C. and a Member of the Eminent Persons Group which prepared a report on the role of the Asian Development Bank. Among other illustrious alumni who have served the Government in various capacities are Ashok Lahiri (former Chief Economic Adviser, Government of India), Tarun Das (former Economic Adviser, Ministry of Finance and Adviser, Planning Commission), Ashim Dasgupta (ex-Finance Minister, Government of West Bengal) and Amit Mitra (currently Finance Minister, Government of West Bengal).
Ex-students of the Economics department have also carved out important niches in the private sector and non-academic world. The names of Satyajit Ray (one of the world’s great film directors), Shahidullah Kaiser (novelist from Bangladesh, who became one of the early martyrs in the fight for independence) Pandit Partha Bose (Sitarist) and Srijit Mukherjee (rising Bengali film director) may be mentioned in this context.
Rabindra Jayanti in the time of COVID-19
UG first semester students of the Department have prepared a programme to celebrate the 161st birthday of Rabindranath Tagore this year.
We hope you will like it.
Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee
Economics Department, Presidency College (1978-1981)
Co-founder, Abdul Jameel Latif Poverty Action Lab
For more on Abhijit Banerjee and Poor Economics, click here
Esther Dufflo
Co-founder, Abdul Jameel Latif Poverty Action Lab
Economics Department congratulates joint winners of Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, along with Michael Kremer
Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee jointly won the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel in 2019, along with his wife, Esther Dufflo, and Michael Kremer, for his work on combating global poverty. Prof. Banerjee is currently Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics in MIT, and co-founder of Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, along with Esther Dufflo. While his initial work on information economics established his reputation, Prof. Banerjee shot into fame and controversy with his application of biological methods in social science research, leading to the development of Randomized Control Trial (RCT) method. This method has arguably become the gold standard in evaluating the impact of intervention strategies in health, education, employment, and allied areas, and is widely used in impact evaluation studies by the “randomistas”. The publication of his book “Poor Economics” in 2011, outlining a strategy to combat global poverty based on RCT and incorporating feedback from the poor, set the seal on his reputation, and it was only a matter of time before he would win the Nobel prize.
Prof. Banerjee has a long association with Presidency University, erstwhile Presidency College. His father was the legendary Dipak Banerjee who, as Head and Professor of the Economics Department, produced one great economist after another. Nirmala Banerjee, his mother, was Professor in Center for Studies in Social Sciences, known for her work on women workers in the informal sector. Prof. Banerjee himself completed his Major in Economics in Presidency College (1978 to 1981); subsequently, he completed his Masters in JNU, before moving to Harvard University for his doctoral research.
In recent years, Prof. Banerjee has been associated with his alma mater as a member of the Mentor group; he has also been a regular visitor to the Economics Department, where he organises the Dipak Banerjee Memorial Lecture series. Three Nobel Laureates - Amartya Sen, Joseph Siglitz, and Jean Tirole - have given this lecture. Esther Dufflo has also visited the Department earlier, and had delivered the Dipak Banerjee Memorial Lecture in 2018. Prof. Banerjee, himself, had given the Nirmal Kanti Majumdar Endowment lecture in 2017.
Current students
Given our reputation, we get the best of the students wanting to study economics. At the under graduate level, students come from schools like South Point, Patha Bhavan, La Martiniere, Don Bosco, Delhi Public School, Mahadevi Birla Girls School, to name a few. At the post graduate level, apart from students graduating from Presidency University, we have students coming from Jadavpur University, Asutosh College, Lady Brabourne College, Bethune College, Scottish College, Maulana Azad College, Loreto College, Shree Shiksayatan College, and others.
Our department still produces one of the finest of the economics students in the country. On an average, one in ten of our postgraduate students apply for higher studies in high ranking universities and institutes in India and abroad. The remaining students get placements in the corporate sector with pay packages at par with those that are offered to the MBA graduates of top management institutes, such as the IIMs.
The performance of our UG students is no less commendable. Since the number of seats in our PG course is about half of that in the UG course, almost half of our UG students have to migrate to other universities in India and abroad for higher studies. We are still the single largest source of the finest students in economics to the best of the universities and institutes in India, like Indian Statistical Institute (Delhi & Kolkata), Delhi School of Economics, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Gokhale Institute of Politics & Economics Pune, Tata Institute of Social Sciences Bangalore, Madras School of Economics, Indian Institute of Managements, XLRI, etc. Subsequently, many of such students have enrolled in the Doctoral programme of MIT, Southern Methodist University, New York State University, Washington University at St. Louis, University at Albany SUNY, University of Minnesota, Purdue University, West Virginia University, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, University of British Colombia, University of Florida, etc.
Our UG students have also applied successfully in the Masters programme of foreign institutes like London School of Economics, University College of London, Sciences-Po Paris, etc., or in the M.Phil. programme of Oxford University.
In the last few years, our UG and PG students had visited Sciences-Po, Paris School of Economics, and Groningen University, or visited Japan under student exchange programmes and other schemes. This experience has broadened their intellect and vision, enhanced their confidence, and sharpened their skills.
Under Graduate
UG 2023-2027 Batch: Class representatives: Srijita Mukherjee and Hrishav Gupta
UG 2022-2025 Batch: Class representatives: Annwesha Pal and Oishaleena Biswas
UG 2021-2024 batch: Class representatives: Pranjali Dangad, Soumyadeep Paul
Post Graduate
PG 2023-2025 batch: Class representatives: Anadarupa Dhar and Atri Deb Chowdhury
PG 2022-2024 batch: Class representatives: Shreya Saha