Abhijit Banerjee

The Nobel prize winner, Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee (born 21 February 1961) is an indian-born naturalized American economist. He currently holds the position of Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. According to Research Papers in Economics (RePEc), he is one of the most productive development economists in the world by ranking  in the top 75 researchers by total research output.

Talking about his academic appointments, he is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and  Econometric Society, a member of the National Academy of Sciences. In addition, he is the co-founder and co-director of an MIT based global research center called the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), promoting the use of scientific evidence to inform poverty alleviation strategies.

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In his early career and the year 1994, Banerjee received a Sloan Research Fellowship, awarded annually to early career researchers with the “potential to revolutionize their fields.” Abhijit Banerjee was awarded the 2019 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. He shared the prize with Michael Kremer and his wife Esther Duflo, “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty.” That’s how he and Esther became the sixth married couple to jointly win a Nobel or Nobel Memorial Prize.

Awards & Accolades

In 2019, Abhijit Banerjee received  the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences along with his two co-researchers,  Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty”.

“Their experimental research methods now entirely dominate development economics.” noted by the press release of  Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

The Nobel committee commented:

“Banerjee, Duflo and their co-authors concluded that students appeared to learn nothing from additional days at school. Neither did spending on textbooks seem to boost learning, even though the schools in Kenya lacked many essential inputs. Moreover, in the Indian context Banerjee and Duflo intended to study, many children appeared to learn little: in results from field tests in the city of Vadodara fewer than one in five third-grade students could correctly answer first-grade curriculum math test questions.

“In response to such findings, Banerjee, Duflo and co-authors argued that efforts to get more children into school must be complemented by reforms to improve school quality.”

For the use of Randomised Controlled Trials, the Nobel prize was a major recognition for their chosen field – Development Economics which evoked mixed emotions in India. His success was celebrated with nationalistic fervor while his approach and pro-poor focus was seen as a negation of India’s current government right-wing ideology as well as broader development discourse.

The Hindu-right wing Bharatiya Janata Party in power at the Union level of India, received Banerjee’s Nobel prize with cold shoulder because of his political activism as the body of communist student’s body in the JNU. Along with the fact that Banerjee was one of the economists consulted by Rahul Gandhi in formulating the basic-income support scheme called NYAY which was the main electoral promise of the Indian National Congress.

In response to his criticism of the Union government’s handling of the country’s economy, Commerce & Industries Minister Piyush Goyal, Twitter stated for speaking on Banerjee’s receiving the Nobel Prize, that Banerjee’s economic theories are based on a leftist viewpoint & by voting for the BJP, the Indian masses have ‘totally rejected’ his thoughts.

BJP Leader Rahul Sinha who had served as the state BJP President in Banerjee’s native state of West Bengal downplayed his achievements and alleged anti-hindu bias on the part of the Nobel committee for awarding Banerjee who in spite of being born to a Brahmin family had married a non-brahmin, over other Hindu academicians who adhered to Hindu norms of hierarchy.

In January 2020, the University of Calcutta awarded him the Doctor of Letters (Honoris Causa).

In September 2022, Banerjee and Esther Duflo received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.

Books Publication

• Aghion, Philippe; Banerjee, Abhijit (2005). Volatility And Growth. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199248612.
• Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak; Bénabou, Roland; Mookherjee, Dilip, eds. (2006). Understanding Poverty. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195305203.
• Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak (2005). Making Aid Work. Cambridge: MIT Press. ISBN 9780262026154.
• Banerjee, Abhijit V.; Duflo, Esther (2011). Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty. New York: PublicAffairs. ISBN 9781610390408.
• Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak; Duflo, Esther, eds. (2017). Handbook of Field Experiments, Volume 1. North-Holland Publishing Company. ISBN 9780444633248.
• Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak; Duflo, Esther, eds. (2017). Handbook of Field Experiments, Volume 2. North-Holland Publishing Company. ISBN 9780444640116.
• Banerjee, Abhijit Vinayak ( 2019 ). A Short History of Poverty Measurements. Juggernaut Books.
• Banerjee, Abhijit V.; Duflo, Esther (2019). Good Economics for Hard Times. PublicAffairs. ISBN 9781541762879.

Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee Biography