The Centre for Social and Economic Progress is delighted to invite you to a seminar titled “QCOs in India’s Chemical Sector: Supply Chain Implications” on Thursday, July 23, 2026, from 3:30 to 5:00 pm (IST) at the CSEP Auditorium, 6, Dr Jose P Rizal Marg, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi – 110021.

The seminar will feature a presentation by Prerna Prabhakar, Fellow, CSEP and Nancy Gupta, Research Associate, CSEP. This will be followed by comments from the panellists Rahul Ahluwalia, Founder-Director, Foundation for Economic Development (FED); Ishtiyaque Ahmed, Programme Director, Industry & Foreign Investment, NITI Aayog; and Sharat Chander, Director, Public Affairs, Samsung. The session will be chaired and moderated by Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Distinguished Fellow, CSEP and former Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, Government of India.

Please note that this is an in-person event only. If you are in Delhi on the day, we invite you to join us for what promises to be a thought-provoking discussion. The event will be available on the CSEP website and YouTube channel upon completion.

Register here to attend 

About the event

Towards the end of 2025, the Government of India revoked several Quality Control Orders (QCOs). The revocation represents a welcome step towards a more calibrated and streamlined approach to the use of QCOs. The decision was driven largely by concerns over the application of QCOs to intermediate goods, which are critical inputs into domestic manufacturing. However, a significant number of QCOs remain in force, including those covering key upstream sectors, continuing to pose challenges for domestic supply chains and manufacturing competitiveness.

Against this backdrop, the seminar will discuss the key findings of CSEP’s forthcoming working paper, “Quality Control Orders in India’s Chemical Sector: Supply-Chain Pressures and Firm-Level Outcomes”. The paper makes three important contributions. First, it maps existing QCOs to both the outputs produced by firms and the intermediate inputs used in production, using firm-level panel data spanning FY 2015 to FY 2024. Second, it analyses the impact of QCOs on regulated inputs and outputs for chemical-using firms, examining their effects on gross value added (GVA), production, and profits. Third, it disaggregates these impacts across firm size to assess whether the effects of QCOs differ between small and large firms.

Building on these findings, the seminar will also examine the need to reassess the criteria for implementing QCOs, ensuring that they are imposed solely to achieve clearly defined quality objectives while minimising unintended compliance costs and supply-chain disruptions across India’s manufacturing ecosystem.

We look forward to your participation.

Chair & Moderator

Montek Singh Ahluwalia  

Montek Singh Ahluwalia is a Distinguished Fellow at CSEP. An economist and civil servant, he was former Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Government of India. He joined the Government in 1979 as Economic Adviser in the Ministry of Finance, after which he held a series of positions including Special Secretary to the Prime Minister; Commerce Secretary; Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs; Finance Secretary in the Ministry of Finance; Member of the Planning Commission and Member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister. In 2001, he was appointed as the first Director of the newly created Independent Evaluation Office of the International Monetary Fund. He resigned from that position in 2004 to take up the position of Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, which he held from 2004 to 2014.

Mr Ahluwalia has been a key figure in Indian economic policy. He writes on various aspects of development economics and has been published in prominent Indian and international journals and books. He co-authored Re-distribution with Growth: An Approach to Policy, which, published in 1975, was a path-breaking book on income distribution. In February 2020, he published his book, Backstage: The Story Behind India’s High Growth Years, an insider’s account of policymaking from 1985 to 2014.

For his outstanding contribution to economic policy and public service, he was conferred the prestigious Padma Vibhushan in 2011, India’s 2nd highest civilian award for exceptional and distinguished service.

Mr Ahluwalia graduated from Delhi University and holds an MA and an MPhil in Economics from Oxford University. He is an Honorary Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford.

Panellists

Rahul Ahluwalia

Rahul Ahluwalia is the Founder-Director of the Foundation for Economic Development (FED), a policy think tank focused on promoting economic growth and governance reforms in India. He has worked across government and the private sector, contributing to research, policy formulation, and governance improvements.

Prior to founding FED, Rahul led the governance team at Central Square Foundation. Before that, he worked as the Officer on Special Duty to the Vice Chairman at NITI Aayog, where he led work on economic policy, governance, education and poverty measurement. He has also worked with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where he focused on identifying ways to improve health sector governance in India.

Earlier in his career, Rahul researched economic and social sector policies at institutions such as Brookings India (now CSEP), IFMR, and the Indian School of Business, where he specialised in econometric analysis using large datasets. He worked in the corporate sector at HCL and Deloitte in marketing and consulting roles.

Rahul holds an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta and a Master’s in Economics from the University of British Columbia.

Ishtiyaque Ahmed 

Ishtiyaque Ahmed is a senior Indian civil servant from the 1992 batch of the Indian Revenue Service (Income Tax). He has over two decades of experience in direct tax administration, with expertise spanning investigations, international taxation, and corporate taxation.

During his career in the Government of India, he has held several key assignments, including in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, where he worked extensively on matters related to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and foreign collaboration. In this role, he contributed to a number of important reforms in India’s FDI policy framework, aimed at enhancing investment flows and improving the business environment.

Mr Ahmed later joined NITI Aayog as Adviser, where he was responsible for the Industry, Mining and Minerals vertical. His work at NITI Aayog has included policy initiatives relating to mining sector reforms, conceptualisation of the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme, and assessment of state-level competitiveness in exports.

He is currently serving as Programme Director (Industry & Foreign Investment) at NITI Aayog, Government of India, New Delhi. In this capacity, he works on policy and analytical issues related to India’s participation in Global Value Chains (GVCs), particularly in high-value sectors such as electronics, automobiles, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals. His portfolio also covers manufacturing sector development, labour-intensive industries, MSME empowerment, industrial infrastructure, mining, the blue economy, and foreign direct investment policy.

Known for his analytical approach and policy-oriented work, Mr Ahmed has contributed to several initiatives aimed at strengthening India’s manufacturing ecosystem, improving the investment climate, and promoting industrial growth and competitiveness.

Sharat Chander 

Sharat Chander is currently Director of Public Policy at Samsung.

Sharat is a former civil servant from the 1999 batch of the Indian Information Service – one of the elite civil services in India.

In the course of a 21-year stint with the Union Government, he worked on several prestigious assignments, including as Officer on Special Duty to Prime Minister Modi from 2014 to 2019, leading official communication and media engagement for the Prime Minister. He also served as Director in the Election Commission of India, heading the voter awareness, accessibility, and media policy divisions. In an earlier stint at India’s public television channel – Doordarshan News – he was Business and Economic Affairs Editor for the channel, and Head of Assignment.

Switching to the corporate sector, Sharat led public policy for India & South Asia at Uber, and was Asia-Pacific Head of Public Policy at Coursera, before his current assignment. He has been a visiting faculty at IIM Ahmedabad and IIT Roorkee.

An architect by training, Sharat is an alumnus of IIT Roorkee, IIM Lucknow and School of Planning and Architecture (SPA, Delhi). He was awarded the prestigious Budhiraja Gold Medal for best all-round performance at IIM Lucknow, and the School of Planning of Architecture Gold Medal for best student of Building Engineering and Management

Presenters

Prerna Prabhakar

Prerna Prabhakar is a Fellow at the Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP). Prerna’s research primarily focuses on trade and industrial policies, and competitiveness. Prior to joining CSEP, she worked with the Council on Energy Environment and Water (CEEW) where she focused on understanding the linkages between sustainability and international trade. Prerna has also worked with the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) on external sector issues, investment potential for Indian States/Union Territories as well as land policy matters. She has also worked on research projects with the University of Delhi, South Asian Network for Development and Environmental Economics (SANDEE), Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS) and Centre for WTO Studies at the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT).

She has completed her PhD from the Department of Business Economics, University of Delhi. She has a postgraduate degree in Economics from TERI School of Advanced Studies (TSAS). She has published her research in Indian and international journals including Environmental Economics and Policy Studies. She regularly contributes opinion pieces to leading newspapers.

Nancy Gupta

Nancy Gupta is a Research Associate in the Growth, Finance and Development vertical at CSEP. She holds a post-graduate degree in Economics. Prior to joining CSEP, Nancy held positions at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) and the Centre for WTO Studies. During her tenure, she focused on fisheries subsidies, household and public finance, municipal bonds, and Indian passenger rail reform.

All content reflects the individual views of the speakers. The Centre for Social and Economic Progress (CSEP) does not hold an institutional view on any subject.

Please contact Gurmeet Kaur at GKaur@csep.org for general queries and Ayesha Manocha at AManocha@csep.org for media queries.