Professor V K Ramachandran, Vice Chairperson, Kerala State Planning Board, was Professor and Head, Economic Analysis Unit, Indian Statistical Institute before joining the Planning Board. His areas of study are development economics; the agrarian question and agrarian relations; rural development; issues of labour and workers in the Indian economy; and class, caste, tribe, and gender discrimination and other forms of social oppression in India. He is the Editor of Review of Agrarian Studies.