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Business Standard

Remembering Dr Radhika Pandey: Sharp mind, generous spirit, quiet loss

By Sudipto Mundle Dr Radhika Pandey, one of India's very promising economists whom I had the privilege of knowing, passed away in the early hours of Saturday 28 June in the prime of her career. It was a sad end to a struggle that started about a month ago. When I called a few weeks ago, I was surprised to learn that she was in the hospital. She first got typhoid, which must have affected her liver because she was in hospital with jaundice. On checking a few days later, her husband told me the jaundice had gotten worse and high temperature was persisting. The next time I called I was stunned. He said the liver transplant was over and mother and son, the donor, were both in the ICU. Her son was subsequently sent home to recuperate but Radhika was put on a ventilator to help her breathe. Her oxygen dependence kept rising and by Saturday morning she was gone. Radhika graduated with Economics Honors from Benares Hindu University and got her Master's degree and Ph.D in Economics from JNV University, Jodhpur. She started her career at the National Law Institute in Jodhpur, combining economics with law, and joined the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy (NIPFP) in 2008, where she continued to serve as Associate Professor till the end. As her husband Sanjay mentioned, she was the friend who showed him economics while he showed her law. Her specialization was monetary policy and the financial sector. Some of her main research contributions were on household consumption behavior, analysis of business cycles, the inflation targeting framework and regulation of the financial sector. She was associated with numerous Task Forces, Working Groups and Committees dealing with these fields such as the Task Force on Public Debt Management Agency, Justice Sri Krishna Commission on Financial Sector Legislative Reforms and several others. She was my 'go to' person on questions relating to monetary and financial sector developments, on which she kept a sharp eye. She was also always very much on top of developments in the wider Indian and global economy. Radhika wrote a weekly column for The Print and also wrote articles for Business Standard, Bloomberg, Quint and other similar media platforms. Apart from her professional competence, Radhika also had strong leadership and interpersonal skills. At the NIPFP she was leading a large team providing technical support to the Department of Economic Affairs in the Union Finance Ministry. She was always as warm and pleasant with her staff as she was with her older colleagues. I noticed that she maintained a sound work-life balance, rare among successful professionals in India. Evenings and weekends were reserved for the family and caring for her ailing mother. Radhika is survived by her husband Sanjay and son Kanishk. To those of us who knew and worked with her, her passing is an irreparable loss. May her soul rest in peace!