Since its founding in 1992 within the School of Arts & Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, the Center for the Advanced Study (CASI) has continued to uphold Penn's global reputation as a leading U.S. institution of research in South Asian studies and scholarship on India. CASI's goals are to engage in policy-relevant research focused on the challenges facing contemporary India; to nurture students' interest in contemporary India through interactions with Visiting Scholars and opportunities to work and conduct research in India; and to act as a public forum on contemporary India by hosting seminars, workshops, and conferences, as well as through our online scholarly publication, India in Transition.
Center for the Advanced Study of India
A Virtual Discussion about Urban Migrants in India with new CASI Director Tariq Thachil July 15, 2020 In partnership with the University of Pennsylvania Institute for the Advanced Study of India (UPIASI), Penn Global, and Penn Alumni A wide-ranging conversation with Tariq Thachil, who Penn welcomed on July 1, 2020 as the new Director of the Center for the Advanced Study of India (CASI), Associate Professor of Political Science at Penn, and the Madan Lal Sobti Chair for the Study of Contemporary India. During this one-hour virtual talk, Professor Thachil discusses his work and research on the politics of urban migrants in India, and sheds light on his vision for the future of CASI. The dialogue and Q&A was moderated by Penn Trustee Ramanan Raghavendran, ENG'89, W'89, LPS'15 (Managing Partner, Amasia). This event is the first of the new Penn in India: Faculty Speaker Series and is made possible in partnership with the Center for the Advanced Study of India (CASI).
"A Breath of Fresh Air: Raising Awareness for Clean Fuel Adoption" featuring Farzana Afridi (Associate Professor, Economics and Planning Unit, Indian Statistical Institute) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
"India and the 1918 Influenza Pandemic" featuring Chinmay Tumbe (Assistant Professor, Economics Area, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
"Managing Migrants: Class and Emigration from India" featuring Rina Agarwala (Associate Professor of Sociology, Johns Hopkins University) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
"Urbanism at Water’s Edge: The Fluid Histories of Property in Calcutta," a book talk featuring Debjani Bhattacharyya (Assistant Professor of History, Drexel University) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
"India’s Political Economy After COVID-19" featuring Roshan Kishore (Data & Political Economy Editor, Hindustan Times; CASI Spring 2020 Visiting Fellow) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
"Economic Development, the Nutrition Trap, and Metabolic Disease" featuring Kaivan Munshi (Professor of Economics, Yale University) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"Intergenerational Mobility in India" featuring Sam Asher (Assistant Professor of International Economics, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"The Challenges to India's National Security" featuring Sushant Singh (Deputy Editor, The Indian Express; Lecturer, Yale University) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"The Absent Dialogue: Politicians, Bureaucrats, and the Military in India," a book discussion featuring Author Anit Mukherjee (Assistant Professor, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University; CASI Non-Resident Visiting Scholar) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"Gender Quotas and Politician Performance in Indian Local Government" featuring Alexander Lee (Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Rochester) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"Emerging Implications of India's POSH Act" featuring Nitya Thummalachetty (CEO & Co-Founder, FortunaHLTH) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"Oral Democracy: Deliberation in Indian Village Assemblies" featuring Vijayendra Rao (Lead Economist, Development Research Group, The World Bank) in conversation with Gautam Nair (CASI Visiting Dissertation Fellow)
"Leading Cause of Blindness – It’s All About Perspectives: Lessons from the Aravind Model" featuring Thulasiraj Ravilla (Executive Director, LAICO, Aravind Eye Care System; and CASI Spring 2019 Visiting Fellow) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Non-Resident Visiting Scholar, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"The RSS: Evolution of India’s Leading Hindu Nationalist Organization" featuring Walter Andersen (Senior Adjunct Professor of South Asia Studies, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Non-Resident Visiting Scholar, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"Mobilizing the Youth? Peripatetic Labor in India’s New Service Economy" featuring Carol Upadhya (Professor, School of Social Sciences, National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), Bangalore) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"Quo Vadis the Quad? A Deterrence Alliance or Self-Deterred Alignment in Indo-Pacific?" featuring Sameer Lalwani (Senior Fellow for Asia Strategy and Director, South Asia Program, Stimson Center) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
A CASI Panel Discussion Election time is upon us again in India. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) secured a sweeping victory in the last national elections, but in the last year, the race has become competitive. What are the key issues for voters in these elections? How much will caste and religion matter? Who has the edge? Our panel of experts attempts to cut through the fog and make sense of the upcoming Indian elections. PANELISTS: Tanvi Madan Director, The India Project Fellow, Foreign Policy Project on International Order & Strategy The Brookings Institution Neelanjan Sircar Assistant Professor, Political Science Ashoka University Senior Fellow, CPR, New Delhi CASI Spring 2019 Visiting Scholar Milan Vaishnav Director & Senior Fellow South Asia Program Carnegie Endowment for International Peace CASI Non-Resident Visiting Scholar MODERATOR: Marshall M. Bouton Acting Director & Visiting Scholar Center for the Advanced Study of India (CASI)
"A People's Constitution: The Everyday Life of Law in the Indian Republic" - a Book Talk featuring Author Rohit De (Lawyer and Assistant Professor of History, Yale University, and Associate Research Scholar, Yale Law School) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"Skeptical Democrats? The Effects of Education for All Policies on Political Behavior in India" featuring Emmerich Davies (Assistant Professor of Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education; Faculty Associate, Weatherhead Center for International Affairs) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"India's Inter-State Water Wars: Causes, Consequences, and Cures" featuring Scott Moore (Associate Professor of Practice, SAS, and Senior Fellow, Water Center, University of Pennsylvania) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"Hollowing Out the State: Status and Redistributive Politics in Colonial India" featuring Pavithra Suryanarayan (Assistant Professor of International Political Economy, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow, and Non-Resident Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute, SAIS, Johns Hopkins University)
"How India Became Democratic" featuring Ornit Shani (Lecturer, University of Haifa) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
"Citizen and State Across the Rural-Urban Divide: Claim Making, Decentralization, and the Uneven Use of Political Intermediaries" featuring Gabi Kruks-Wisner (Assistant Professor, Politics & Global Studies, The University of Virginia) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
CASI Spring 2018 Seminar Series Podcast "Dominant Parties and the Origins of India's Weakly Institutionalized Party System" featuring Gareth Nellis (Postdoctoral Fellow, Evidence in Governance and Politics, University of California, Berkeley, and soon to be Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of California, San Diego) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
CASI Spring 2018 Seminar Series Podcast "Rebel Retirement Through Informal Exit Networks: Evidence from India" featuring Rumela Sen (Postdoctoral Research Scholar, Department of Political Science, Columbia University) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
CASI Spring 2018 Seminar Series Podcast "The Long Arm of Resistance: Gender-Equalizing Reform and Parental Care" featuring Rachel Brulé (Assistant Professor of Political Science, New York University Abu Dhabi) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)
CASI Fall 2017 Seminar Series Podcast "The Colonial Construction of Political Orders: Uneven State Formation and its Consequences in South Asia" featuring Adnan Naseemullah (Lecturer in South Asia and International Relations, Department of War Studies & the India Institute, King’s College London) in conversation with Bilal Baloch (CASI Postdoctoral Research Fellow)