Adani’s think tank flexes its muscles in Delhi

Daybreak

The episode explores the rapid rise of Chintan Research Foundation, a new Delhi-based think tank backed by 100 crore rupees from the Adani G

Key takeaways

• The Adani Group committed 100 crore rupees to fund Chintan Research Foundation.
• Chintan's policy suggestions were written into the Shanti Bill, opening India's nuclear sector to private players.

Main topics

• Corporate-backed think tanks
• Indian nuclear sector privatization

Notable quotes

What does 100 crore rupees buy you in Delhi's policy world?

Conclusion

The episode serves as a critical examination of how well-funded, well-

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:01) Here's something that most people probably don't know about how policy gets made in India. By the time a minister stands up in the parliament to announce a new law, the idea behind it has usually been around for years. It's been circulating at researchers and officials at institutions that most people have never heard of. These places are called think tanks. And the less you've heard of them, the better they're probably doing their job. But... Here is what is harder to ignore. 100 crore rupees. That is what one of India's most powerful conglomerates committed to funding a policy shop that two years ago was made up of five people and a couple of South Delhi cafes. That conglomerate is Adani and the think tank is called Chintan. And the question worth sitting with is, what does 100 crore rupees buy you in Delhi's policy world? Quite a lot, as it turns out. As my colleague, the Ken reporter Inderpal Singh wrote in his recent story, in just over a year, Chintan published 350 papers, held 30 events and got 14 of its suggestions, some of them word to word, written into a law passed by the parliament. I'm talking about the Shanti Bill that opened up India's nuclear sector to private players for the first time in our country's history. Unsurprisingly, just two months later, Adani Power floated a new subsidiary to enter the nuclear power field. We even covered this on Daybreak. I will add the link to the show notes of this episode. So today, we're going to look at two questions. How does a brand new think tank get its fingerprints on national legislation this fast? And what does that tell us about how policy actually gets shaped in this country? Speaker 1 (1:58) Welcome to Daybreak, a business podcast from the Ken. I'm your host, Nigra Sharma, and I don't chase the news cycle. Instead, every day of the week, my colleague Rachel Varghese and I will come to you with one business story that is worth understanding and worth your time. Speaker 1 (2:39) Let's start with the