Lately, I have realized that LinkedIn has evolved into a platform to share opinions and thought leadership articles. It not only offers a great degree of flexibility and freedom of expression but also the unique advantage of direct engagement with readers. So, I often share my insights through long-form posts on LinkedIn.
Incentive Wars: Why walking away can be wiser – Deccan Herald
In a world that glorifies relentless competition and celebrates winning at any cost, real wisdom lies in knowing when to step back. Google chose Andhra Pradesh over Karnataka for its $15 billion AI data centre – and suddenly, people started calling it a “missed opportunity” and a “policy failure” for Bengaluru. Reports suggest that Andhra Pradesh offered incentives worth ₹22,000 crore, including 25% subsidies on land and water, free electricity, and reimbursement of state GST. By backing out of the race for Google’s AI data centre, Karnataka has chosen prudence and restraint over optics. Drawing parallels with Amazon’s HQ2 saga and Tesla’s Gigafactory, I explore how excessive incentive competition among states can erode public value, strain resources, and create long-term ecological and fiscal risks. Read more
Infiltration Game: India’s demographic challenge – Deccan Herald
Infiltration is not loud like war; it advances quietly, compounding its force over decades. India must shape its demographic destiny by design – before drift turns into fate. In his Independence Day speech, Prime Minister Narendra Modi warned of a “well-thought-out conspiracy” to alter India’s demography through illegal infiltration and announced a high-powered Demography Mission to counter it. That warning now feels particularly urgent when we look at our neighbourhood. Bangladesh’s recent civil unrest has reportedly already triggered fresh waves of infiltration. Now, Nepal is facing turmoil – and unlike Bangladesh, India shares an open border with Nepal, making the risk of mass inflows immediate and real. Across the Indian subcontinent, instability has become a norm, and each crisis in our neighbourhood risks becoming a demographic burden at home. This challenge deserves a deeper examination – not just politically, but through the lenses of evolutionary game theory and complex adaptive systems. Read more
The IP Game India must learn to win – Deccan Herald
What happens when a billion-dollar luxury fashion house copies a Rs 1000 traditional Indian craft, rebrands it, and sells it for Rs 1.2 lakh? The Kolhapuri chappal vs Prada controversy is not just a case of imitation – it is a reminder of a recurring strategic failure: our inability to protect what is ours.
In game theory, there is a classic asymmetry between players who know the rules and players who don’t. The global intellectual property (IP) regime is one such game. Developed economies are seasoned players – they know when to patent, how to trademark, and where to litigate. India, on the other hand, often enters the field blindfolded. And in such a setup, a hungry lion will always pounce on an unguarded fawn. Read more
How Bihar can address the economic concerns of the returning migrants – The Hindu Business Line
Noted economist Jean Dreze recently stated that Bihar will be the worst-hit State due to the massive reverse migration triggered by the coronavirus pandemic. I could not agree with him more on this. According to the latest study by the Institute of Population Sciences, 50 percent of Bihar households are exposed to migration. With the breadwinners of the family becoming unemployed, and seemingly in the absence of any concrete plan of the Bihar government to tackle this challenge, the State is staring at social and economic doom. With agriculture and arts & crafts being the largest income generators in the rural areas, the State government must go all out to provide a further boost to both these sectors. Read more
Covid-19 has proven that the Internet needs a complete rehaul – Economic Times
Times of upheaval, such as war and pandemics, are always times of radical change. During World War II, with men away from war, many jobs were opened up for women that were previously being carried out by men. Women proved that they could do the so-called “men’s work”. Women never looked back after that. The global Spanish flu of 1918, one of the deadliest pandemics in human history, revolutionized national health policies in many European countries. The world right now is fighting a war against the Covid-19 pandemic. The novel coronavirus is here to change the world in multiple dimensions. One of these dimensions is – the Internet as infrastructure. Read more
Justice delayed! Are courts involved in an infinite game? – Forbes India
Indian judiciary is going through a massive crisis. According to the National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG), as of October 2018, about 30 million cases are pending in the various Indian courts. Of all the pending cases, about 7 million cases are more than 5 years old, and 2.3 million cases are more than 10 years old. In July 2018, the former Chief Justice Dipak Misra, while delivering the inaugural address at the Conference on the National Initiative to Reduce Pendency and Delay in the Judicial System, urged the high courts to form think tanks comprising judges, lawyers, and academicians to explore innovative models for reducing the pendency of cases. He emphasized that the pendency of cases for long periods raises serious questions about the efficacy of the Indian judicial system and brings considerable disrepute to the institution. He proposed a 15-point plan to tackle this problem. Justice Ranjan Gogoi, the new Chief Justice of India, has also expressed his plans to address this challenge. He is of the view that the pendency problem has the potential of making the judicial system itself irrelevant. Legal experts believe that the problem could worsen in the days to come. This article presents a game-theoretic conjecture of the delayed judicial processes and mounting pendency of cases in Indian courts. Read more
Judges often fail to interpret a legal norm. Or do they? – Forbes India
In July 2009, the Delhi High Court decriminalized homosexuality, which was overturned by the Supreme Court of India in December 2013. The Supreme Court in September 2018 overturned its previous judgment, and homosexuality was decriminalized again. While teaching game theory at my institute, I was posed this question by a student: “This is not the first time one judgment has been overturned by another judgment. In this case, the courts were interpreting the meaning of ‘unnatural offenses’, a linguistic expression from Section 377 of the IPC. Why do our learned judges often fail to come up with a rational and objective interpretation of a legal norm that cannot be overturned? Is there any strategic reason for failing to select a proper meaning?” Read more
Rajeev R. Tripathi 