Rajiv institute

Two professionals who have recently been inducted in Gandhi’s core team -- Praveen Chakravarty and K Raju — are likely to play key roles in RGICS, the leader added.

Chakravarty heads the Congress party’s Data Analytics Department while former IAS officer Raju is the new head of Gandhi’s core team.

The Congress has also formed a group headed by former finance minister P Chidambaram to study all the legislations passed under the Modi government. “The party gives a lot of importance to research, analysis and the plan to revamp the RGICS as a party think tank is also for the same reason. Think tanks are necessities in today’s political landscape,” said the former minister quoted above.

The Vivekananda International Foundation, ranked among the “best think tanks with a political party affiliation” globally in 2016 by the University of Pennsylvania, is headed by former deputy National Security Adviser Arvind Gupta. It focuses on issues related to international relations, defence, the economy and governance, and on Track 2 exchanges.

Among key government functionaries who have been associated with it before they took up their current roles are the principal secretary to the prime minister Nripendra Misra, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Delhi’s lieutenant-governor Anil Baijal. lankar, director, Indian Institute of Public Health, Gandhinagar.

Disparities between states are massive. While Kerala and Goa have neonatal mortality rates of 10/1,000 live births, the figure for Bihar and Uttarakhand is at 44/1,000. States with the highest birth rates have higher newborn deaths.

Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan account for 46% of all births and 57% of India’s neonatal deaths.