Hello, I am Manali!

I am an Associate Fellow at the Centre for Economic Growth at the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER), New Delhi. I hold a Ph.D. in Economics and Public Policy from Tufts University.

My research focuses on labour productivity, firm productivity, and urban economics. During my doctoral work, I used causal methods to evaluate programmes at the intersection of gender, education, and work: how a subway expansion quietly transformed women’s college enrolment in Delhi, why a well-intentioned school policy in India fell short, and how extreme heat is reshaping the time burden of women in Sub-Saharan Africa.

I bring over five years of research and policy experience across academia, international organisations, and industry. Before NCAER, I was a Research Associate at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), where I worked on labour and gender economics using administrative and survey data from across Sub-Saharan Africa. I also spent time at Amazon in New York, applying causal inference and machine learning to business questions. I have taught undergraduate and graduate students at Tufts University.