Research 

Gender Norms and Motherhood Penalty: Experimental Evidence from India,  with Arjun Bedi and Matthias Rieger

Gender norms and community origins shape the motherhood penalty in India, with mothers from matrilineal and Northeast communities facing less discrimination in the labor market. 

A previous version was circulated as IZA Discussion Paper No. 11360  

Does Market Power Breed Inefficiency? Evidence from Firm-Level Inventory Dynamics,  with Anisha Shukla.

When competition vanishes, managers relax: Market power breeds operational slack, causing firms with high markups to exhibit slower inventory turnover, with this inefficiency being amplified by weak corporate governance structures and poor CEO incentives. 

When the Bullet Hits the Chain: Localized Sentimental Shocks and the Governance of Buyer–Supplier Relationships, with Adityava Mazumder. 

Emotionally charged local events, sentimental shocks, reshape buyer–supplier networks by increasing perceived behavioral uncertainty, prompting firms to reconfigure interfirm relationships even without physical disruptions. . 

Banking Resilience: Does Frontline Workforce Gender Composition Buffer Deposit Demand Irregularities?, with Abhiman Das. 

Higher female representation among frontline bank employees helps stabilize deposits during localized economic shocks, revealing a novel workforce composition channel through which service organizations build relational resilience. 

Import Competition, Myopic Marketing, and Long-Term Implications.

Rising import competition pressures US manufacturing firms to prioritize short-term gains through myopic marketing and R&D, boosting short-term performance but risking long-term market power and competitiveness. 

Government as Marketer: Policy-Driven Product Promotion and Labor Market Congestion, with Neeraj Katewa and Sangeeta Misra.

A government-led product promotion policy in Uttar Pradesh, India triggers short-term wage declines due to migration-driven labor bottlenecks, revealing how demand-side policies can strain operational capacity, but yields long-term gains as markets adjust.  

Who Benefits from Private Schools? The Demand for Private Schools in Rural India.

Private schooling in rural India acts as an equalizer, offering significant academic gains for girls and disadvantaged children compared to boys and their advantaged peers, but access is hindered by liquidity constraints. 

Can a Signal Save Lives? The Ripple Effects of Mobile Network Infrastructure on Rural Healthcare Access in India,  with Anisha Shukla and Rajesh Chandwani.

Internet access in rural India is linked to better healthcare use—especially antenatal care, child immunization, and insurance enrollment, with the biggest gains among disadvantaged and remote households. 

Digital Divide or Digital Equalizer? Digital Technology and Educational Achievements in Rural India,  with Anisha Shukla.

Digital accessibility affects educational outcomes in rural India, finding that while it improves test scores of all children, disadvantaged groups benefit the most, though they have less access, potentially widening educational inequality. 

Son Preference, Parental Resource Allocation, and Gender Gap in Mathematics, Oxford Economic Papers, Accepted.

Gender gap in mathematics emerges after early childhood and is strongly associated with elder son preference and unequal parental resource allocation within families. Boys and girls start with similar math ability at age five, but a large gender gap emerges and widens with age. The gap is closely linked to elder son preference.

Shadow Education and the Effects of Family Size on Parental Educational Investments, Journal of Demographic Economics, Accepted.

This paper uncovers how Indian households under financial constraints exhibit a child quantity–quality tradeoff, investing more in private tutoring per child when they have fewer children

Shadow Education, Intra-Household Financial Resource Allocation, and Educational Achievements, 2025, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 233, 106993.

Replication Files 

Girls and later-born children in India are disadvantaged in shadow education expenditures due to parental elder son preference, leading to notable gaps in cognitive test scores.   

Does Signaling Childcare Support on Job Applications Reduce the Motherhood Penalty?, with Arjun Bedi and Matthias Rieger, 2022, Review of Economics of the Household, 20(2), 373-387. Replication Files

Signaling access to childcare support on CVs reduces the motherhood penalty in India's labor market, highlighting the potential for support policies to mitigate gender-based employment discrimination. 

Gray University Degrees: Experimental Evidence from India,  with Matthias Rieger, 2020, Education Finance and Policy, 15(2), 292-309.               

EFP Takeaways    Replication Files

Gray degrees in India increase job interview callbacks but are still viewed less favorably than authentic degrees, highlighting the complex dynamics of degree legitimacy in the hiring process.