All Things Policy

Anthropic just revealed an AI model that found a 27-year-old bug in one of the world's most secure operating systems. In this episode, Col KPM Das and Bharath Reddy discuss the implications when vulnerability discovery just got automated at scale. Check out Takshashila's brand-new offering - an Expert Capsule Course on the Politics and Policy of Critical Minerals - school.takshashila.org.i...

Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) represent a significant technological shift in nuclear power generation, offering scaled-down versions of traditional nuclear reactors with output capacities between 20 and 300 MW. In this episode, Bhumika Sevkani and Anwesha Sen examine the increasing importance of SMRs, their distinction from conventional nuclear power plants, the emerging economic evidence surround...

India’s Census 2027 promises to be more than just a population count. With digital tools, geospatial mapping, and innovations like DigiPin, it could fundamentally change how the Indian state collects and understands population data. But what makes this census different from previous exercises? And how could better spatial data improve planning, infrastructure, and governance? In this episode of Al...

AI isn't coming to Indian schools; it's already there, and students are embracing it. But is the Indian school system ready? Survey findings by Center of Policy Research and Governance (CPRG) reveal how AI tools are transforming academic habits and their impact on exam preparation, time management, performance, and overall learning journeys. Carl Jaison speaks to Pranav Gupta, PhD candidat...

In this conversation, Professor Kingshuk Chatterjee joins Aishwaria Sonavane to place the current West Asian conflict in its deeper historical context. The discussion explores the argument that West Asia is facing a structural crisis and examines how this breakdown manifests in ongoing conflicts across Lebanon, Gaza, and Iran. The conversation also traces the ideological legacy of the Iranian Revo...

Is India's sports integrity on the line? Listen to the latest podcast: "India’s Sporting Achilles’ Heel: Age Fraud, Doping, Coaching Gaps" Malathi Renati (Head of Policy School, Takshashila) converses with the experienced sports journalist G Rajaraman, who has 40+ years as a sports communication specialist and was the Paris 2024 Olympics Media Attaché. From grassroots age cheats domi...

Cities are the engines of economic growth - generating the bulk of GDP, driving innovation, and shaping the everyday lived experience of millions. Yet in India, cities are constrained in terms of power, finances, and accountability. In this episode, Sarthak Pradhan speaks with Prabhat Kumar, who discusses Janaagraha’s Municipal Finance Blueprint submitted to the 16th Finance Commission and unpacks...

November 2025 saw the launch of BIRSA 101- India’s first indigenous CRISPR-based gene therapy for sickle cell disease. What does this mean for affordable gene therapy, disease reduction and the research ecosystem in India? Shambhavi Naik explains some interesting aspects of this in this conversation with Suman Joshi. Check out Takshashila's brand-new offering - an Expert Capsule Course on the...

Amid the bleak news coverage of the projectile war in West Asia, there was one development that served as a glimmer of hope for humanity at large. NASA’s Artemis 2 mission, which took astronauts from the US and Canada on a flyby of the moon, came about after a long interregnum and also took humans the farthest from Earth. To discuss the mission technicalities, history and some larger questions abo...

The opening campaign of the US/Israeli - Iran War has witnessed an asymmetric fight between the two parties, playing to their different strengths. The US and Israel relied heavily on airpower and widespread degradation and breaking the will of the population, while Iran has focused on selective missile bombardment and drone attacks for strategic leverage. How are the two parties faring? Join our m...

Navigation satellites are invisible infrastructure - until they aren't. In an era where GPS signals are being jammed over conflict zones, spoofed to sink ships, and denied to adversaries in wartime, controlling your own navigation system has become a marker of true strategic sovereignty. India built NavIC (Navigation with Indian Constellation) for exactly this reason. But today, the system has...

Following the failure of the last atomic clock on IRNSS-1F, India’s homegrown navigation system, NavIC, has fallen below operational strength. In this episode, Kavya Rai sits down with Dr. Y. Nithiyanandam to discuss why this "invisible" infrastructure failure threatens India's ₹1 lakh crore geospatial economy and what it means for our strategic autonomy. All Things Policy is a daily...

In this episode of the Iran Brief of Takshashila’s All Things Policy podcast, Amit Kumar discusses with Anushka Saxena the reactions of three of the so-called "CRINK" countries - China, Russia and North Korea - to the war of their fourth counterpart, Iran. They talk about potential military and dual-use relations within the CRINK, and how US and Israel's actions may be changing their...

As the Indian Ocean grows in strategic importance, India and Australia are increasingly seen as key partners in shaping its future. In this episode, Vanshika Saraf speaks with Rushali Saha on how the two countries can move beyond parallel engagement towards a more coordinated maritime partnership, with a focus on non-traditional security challenges and regional capacity-building. All Things Policy...

In this episode of the All Things Policy podcast, Abhishek Kadiyala and Bhumika Sevkani examine why the US Congress has repeatedly failed to restrain President Trump’s military actions in Iran, despite multiple attempts to invoke its constitutional authority. The conversation centres on the War Powers Resolution of 1973 and how it was designed to limit unilateral presidential war-making. Tracing l...

What happens to the AI boom when data centres become military targets? Shobhankita Reddy and Bharath Reddy discuss how the Iran war is stress-testing AI supply chains — from helium shortages and energy dependencies to the future of Gulf data centre investments and the profitability of frontier AI. All Things Policy is a daily podcast on public policy brought to you by the Takshashila Institution,...

AgriStack represents India’s ambition to build a digital public infrastructure for agriculture, linking farmer, land, and crop data to improve credit, insurance, and market access. But how ready is the state to build and govern such a system at scale? In this episode, Astha Rastogi and Arindam Goswami explore what it takes to operationalise AgriStack, the role of AI and data, and what this means f...

For decades, the Iranian nuclear programme has caused consternation in Western capitals. Despite US and Israeli efforts involving negotiations, cyber and aerial bombing over the years, Iran has managed to get to a stage where it has about 440 kgs of 60 per cent enriched uranium. In this episode of All Things Policy special series on Iran, tech geopolitics researcher Lokendra Sharma sits down with...

Digital technology is often seen as a fix for inefficiency and corruption in government welfare programmes—but does it actually deliver on that promise? In this episode, Vanita Leah Falcao discusses her research on the Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY), with Suman Joshi and Ameya Naik explaining how technology-mediated systems are reshaping service delivery on the ground. Through the len...

Think about the last time you were in a crowded metro station. Did you consciously decide what to do, or did you simply follow what everyone else was doing? Public policy often assumes people are rational actors. But behaviour is shaped by something far more human: norms that tell us what others expect, habits that run on autopilot, and incentives that reward or punish us. In this episode, Arindam...

As the projectile war continues to rage on in West Asia, engulfing multiple Gulf states in addition to Israel, the US and Iran, fissures are developing in Trump's base (Make America Great Again or MAGA in short). Joseph Kent, a US counterterrorism official, has resigned, citing the ongoing war. Kent has joined a vocal section of the MAGA base that continues to criticise the US involvement in t...

In this episode of The Iran Brief by All Things Policy, we take a closer look at how the West Asian conflict is evolving as it enters its fourth week and why its consequences are now being felt far beyond the battlefield. The Takshashila team breaks down the growing energy anxieties triggered by attacks on critical oil and gas infrastructure and the disruption around the Strait of Hormuz. We try t...

In this episode of All Things Policy, Bhumika Sevkani speaks with Anushka Saxena, Staff Research Analyst at the Takshashila Institution, to unpack China’s interests amid the escalating Israel-Iran War. As China voices its opposition against the U.S. and Israel for launching military strikes against Iran, what are the economic and geopolitical stakes at play?  Anushka Saxena argues that while the c...

In this episode, Sowmya Prabhakar is in conversation with Dr Y Nithiyanandam to vent about the heat. We will examine it through the lens of Society, Markets, and Government to determine possible solutions. All Things Policy is a daily podcast on public policy brought to you by the Takshashila Institution, Bengaluru.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠...

AI systems depend on vast amounts of labelled data, produced by “data workers” who tag images, categorise text, and review content so machine-learning models can function accurately and safely. While the data-annotation market is rapidly expanding, the labour behind it often remains invisible. Much of this work uses BPO firms in countries like India, where workers - frequently women - are recruite...