Policy-making in India can often be reactive and seek quick fixes, addressing symptoms of problems while overlooking their root causes. As a result, such policies may have limited impact or unintended consequences, which can, in turn, lead to another set of short-sighted measures to undo the harm.
TrustBridge seeks to go deeper to break out of this cycle. Our evidence-based research focuses on understanding the underlying causes of our economic policy and attendant rule of law challenges. This approach is necessarily interdisciplinary, integrating legal analysis, economic evaluation and data-driven research, through which we seek to develop actionable solutions rooted in transparency and practicality.
FOCUS AREAS
1
Regulatory state capacity
Regulators have both quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial powers, writing regulations and issuing orders that significantly influence the behaviour and perceptions of market participants. Orders serve not only as immediate decisions but also as benchmarks for future regulatory and market practices.
Our work aspires to build capacity towards high-quality regulatory decision-making. This involves four key elements:
- Assessing the quality of regulations on key issues by conducting a cost-benefit analysis before the policy implementation and after;
- Assessing the substantive and procedural quality of regulatory orders using Large Language Models (LLMs) and other emerging technologies;
- Analysing how regulations and regulatory orders affect the investability of the markets they govern; and
- Providing practical recommendations to improve the quality and clarity of regulation-making and order writing.
Our work currently examines capital markets and electricity. We intend to expand this work to other regulatory domains, especially to debt markets supporting a broader culture of accountability and adherence to the rule of law across all regulatory institutions. The strengthening of the foundation of regulatory decisions will lead to more predictable and robust regulatory environments.
2
Government contracting and dispute resolution
The government is one of the biggest litigants in Indian courts. This is costly in terms of tax-payer money spent on litigation, the opportunity cost of time, the impact on businesses that contract with the government, and the consequent impact of delays in court processes on other litigants. Our work focuses on two critical aspects of government litigation:
1. Studying the design of government contracts to identify issues in risk allocation and fair play that lead to:
a. Lack of interest by the private sector in participating in these bids leading to lower investment
b. Disputes and subsequent litigation when the private sector does participate
2. Examining how alternative dispute resolution (ADR) influences and is influenced by government litigation. A robust ADR mechanism can reduce the burden on courts, but its effectiveness depends on its design, implementation, and interaction with the broader legal framework.
Our work currently examines these questions in the context of Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) and contracts for road and highway construction by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI).
PROJECTS
Improving electricity regulation in Tamil Nadu
Electricity reform in Tamil Nadu faces many difficulties. One element of this is the problem of regulation. The anticipated behaviour of the regulator in the future constitutes one element of the negative environment which shapes the hesitation of the private sector to invest. In this paper, we bring knowledge from the field of regulatory theory, […]