Understanding the role of efficiency in the electricity generation process for promoting human development in India: Findings from the novel multiple threshold nonlinear ARDL modelling

The present paper seeks to examine the effects of electricity generation efficiency on the index of human capital in India over 1980–2021 through the novel multi threshold non-linear autoregressive distributed lag model. We find strong evidence that the effects of efficiency in the generation of electricity on human development have varied across thresholds/quantiles. We suggest that, for improving human development in India by suitable energy policies, both policy makers and the public sector managers will need to make directed efforts to use most robust and energy saving technologies in the electricity generation process. •The study addresses the relationship between efficiency in the electricity generation process and human development.•The MTNARDL method is used because conditional mean analysis failed to provide the inner dynamics of the relationship.•We find strong evidence that the said relationship varied across thresholds/quantiles in the short and long run.