This month on CPR Perspectives — our flagship interview series commemorating the Centre for Policy Research’s 50th anniversary — we bring you a conversation with KP Krishnan, an Honorary Research Professor at CPR. Krishnan spent three and a half decades in the IAS, retiring in 2019 as Secretary, Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship. Over his years in the civil services, he served at positions in the government of Karnataka and the Union Government, as well as a stint at the World Bank, giving him a unique vantage point to observe the changes taking place in Indian economic and development policy following the 1991 liberalization. He has previously held the BoK Visiting Professorship in Regulation in the University of Pennsylvania Law School and served as the IEPF Chair Professor at the National Council of Applied Economic Research, in addition to stints as Visiting Professor of Economics, Public Policy and Regulation at the LBSNAA Mussorie, ISB Hyderabad and Mohali, Ashoka University and IIM Bangalore. In the first part of our conversation, I spoke to Krishnan about choosing a career in the civil services, how policy feedback operated within the IAS especially as the economy opened up and the question of being research-minded vs operational within the Indian bureaucracy. In the second part of the conversation, which you will receive later this month, we spoke about how external research was integrated into government systems, Krishnan's work at CPR looking at how well we understand Indian regulators and what advice he has for young scholars.