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For decades, India has led the drive for financial inclusion of poor rural women to facilitate attainment of development objectives like poverty alleviation and women's empowerment. More recently, it has promoted digital financial inclusion to further its fight against poverty and gender inequality and support the attainment of UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In this paper we take stock of how India's digital financial revolution has affected financial transactions and services with a focus on gender inclusivity for the attainment of the SDGs. We propose a framework to understand the gender inclusivity of digital financial inclusion initiatives that connects the macro developments in the sector with the micro-level experiences of improving women's access and use of these services. We draw on India's nationwide developments and present a case study of an initiative that specifically promotes gender inclusive finance. Our findings suggest that India has made great advances in promoting digital financial inclusion but at the same time, the country has struggled to achieve gender parity even within specific finance-focused programmes designed to improve gender inclusivity. We reflect on policy implications of these findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 has severely impacted the society not only in terms of health but also in terms of economic survival of individuals. Unless adequate support is provided, the pandemic will have long-lasting effects, especially on the lives of the most vulnerable, often working in the informal sector. In this article, we present a case study drawing on systems thinking and complexity theory, outlining how the city of Mumbai has responded to COVID-19. We find a multifaceted scenario where non-profit organizations, businesses and citizen volunteers operate alongside government bodies to support Mumbai's population to overcome this pandemic. We provide broader policy lessons, as well as more specific lessons in relation to particular actors, from the first wave of the pandemic stressing the importance of becoming 'systems thinkers' and highlighting the importance of forming new partnerships and exploring new modes of knowledge sharing to effectively respond to crises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]