2024-04-13 16:38:46
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On April 19th, Lok Sabha elections are going to start in India, the largest democracy in the world. 96.9 crore people are expected to vote in this six-week election. Incumbent Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party are aiming for a third term in government.
India leads the way as a country with a nuclear weapon and as a country that has landed its spaceship on the moon. After the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, India has become the most populous country in the world and has overtaken the UK economy to become the 5th largest economy in the world.
Many have predicted that India will emerge as the world’s next superpower. Still, that progress was mixed with optimism and caution.
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Caption India is the 10th largest exporter in the world, according to the World Bank.
A growing economy
During his visit to South Africa last August, Prime Minister Modi said, “India will be the growth engine of the world”. However, by the end of 2023, India has been recognized as the world’s fastest growing large economy with an economy that expanded by 8.4 percent in the last three months.
World economies can be ranked by GDP (Gross Domestic Product), which measures the economic activity of companies, governments, and individuals in a country.
According to several financial institutions, including US investment bank Morgan Stanley, India is on track to become the third largest economy by 2027, overtaking Germany and Japan.
India was one of the poorest countries in the world when it gained independence in 1947. Decades of British rule left behind poor infrastructure and an agricultural sector that could not accommodate the growing population.
At that time the life expectancy per capita in India was 35 years. But today it has nearly doubled to 67 years, according to the World Bank. Meanwhile the global average is 71 years.
According to the World Bank, India is the 10th largest exporting country in the world. It mainly includes refined oil, diamonds and packaged medicines. India’s booming economy has been fueled by its thriving services sector and the growth of its telecom and software sectors.
But economists note that new jobs are not being created at the same pace. According to an estimate by HSBC, as India’s population grows over the next decade, it is expected to create 70 million jobs. But there is no chance of making more than one-third of it.
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Caption According to the UN, India has a large number of citizens living abroad.
‘Population Growth’
The average age of India’s population is lower than that of many developed countries. According to the UN, in 2022, India’s population will have a median age of 28.7 compared to China’s median age of 38.4 and Japan’s 48.6.
Currently, the total population of India is 140 crores. Indian economists Bashar Chakraborty and Gaurav Dalmiya predict that by 2030, India’s working-age population will cross 100 crore.
Speaking to the Harvard Business Review, they said the economic progress achieved by other Asian countries, including Japan and China, relies on this “working-age population.”
But retaining all those workers in the country is difficult. According to the UN, a large number of citizens of India live abroad. That is about 1.8 crore people.
About 25 lakh people go abroad every year. This includes those who have achieved higher education.
More Indians are opting to stay abroad indefinitely, according to statistics from the Ministry of External Affairs, which records the number of people who have revoked their Indian citizenship. Dual citizenship is not allowed in India. By 2022, more than 225,000 Indians will have their citizenship revoked. This is the highest number in the past decade.
Finding employment locally is a challenge for many.
According to government statistics, India’s unemployment rate is 8%. It is 3.8% in the US. In March, the International Labor Organization reported that 83% of India’s unemployed are in the 15-29 age group, with the majority having at least a secondary education.
Siddhartha Deb, an Indian journalist and author, says, “I travel across India and talk to the youth. They are exhausted.”
“Economic growth has brought new infrastructure like highways and airports, and the number of millionaires has increased. But people in India in general are struggling,” he says.
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Caption Professor Ashwini Deshpande says many working women are self-employed.
Where have the working women gone?
According to the government, the percentage of women working in India is 33%. This is lower in India compared to 56.5% in the US, 60.5% in China and the global average of 49%, according to the World Bank.
Although more Indian women have advanced in education than in the past, other women who marry are forced to follow the culture and stay at home.
Professor Ashwini Deshpande, an economist at Azim Premji University in Bangalore, says many working women are self-employed.
“There is an urgent need to increase women’s participation in regular paid jobs with employment contracts and social security benefits,” she says.
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Caption The number of Indian billionaires has risen from one in 1991 to 162 in 2022, according to Forbes.
Persistent inequality
India is one of the most unequal countries in the world.
Nearly half of India’s population lives below the World Bank’s median poverty line, while the number of Indian billionaires has risen from one in 1991 to 162 in 2022, according to Forbes.
Dr Ashoka Moti, professor of international economic policy at Princeton University in the US, says, “There is vast inequality in India”. And this is the main reason to think that “it is foolish to say that India will become a superpower without major structural changes”.
One such key change, Dr Moti notes, is bringing about social reforms that address inequality, including strengthening India’s public health system.
“Hundreds of millions of Indians find it difficult to find work. And education and health are poor,” he says.
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Caption Writer Devika Rage believes her country is facing a wave of “communist conflict”.
escalating political dissent
Political differences are nothing new in India. Since the 1800s, there has been a debate over whether India should be a secular or a Hindu country. About 80% of people in India are Hindus.
The debate intensified following the landslide victory of Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist BJP in 2014.
Hate crimes against Muslims have increased. In March, the UN and the US government have both voiced their concerns against the CAA.
Author Devika Rage, who recently published Quarterlife, a controversial novel on ‘India after 2014 elections’, believes her country is facing a wave of “communal conflict”.
He said: “Identity politics was already a factor in how people vote in India. But the 2014 elections pushed people in different directions from the level of friends and family.”
“It’s hard to deny India’s rate of growth, but at the same time India has not only compromised civil liberties but is also rife with communal conflict. When such an environment quickly spirals out of control, the consequences will be dire.”
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Caption India does not always follow the will of the West.
“India is not a puppet of the West”
For years the West had hoped that India would become a counterbalancing force to China’s influence in Asia. In addition to being a nuclear-armed nation, it also has the world’s second-largest military with 1.45 million active personnel. But India does not always follow the wishes of the West.
It has drawn criticism over the past two years for its neutral stance in the Russia-Ukraine war and for buying Russian oil at discounted prices in defiance of Western sanctions against Moscow.
Sania Kulkarni, an international relations expert at the London School of Economics and Political Science, said the West could expect India to be “less challenging” than China for Western countries to approach. But he always cautions that India has its own goals.”
“It is wrong to expect India to act as an ambassador for the West,” he says, adding that “India insists on being a non-Western country against anti-Westernism.”
– This is a Collective Newsroom publication for the BBC
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