Over six and a half decades since India’s declaration of independence, the country brought about an outstanding landmark where agricultural reform has been structurally and drastically made, from significant dependence on grain imports to a global agricultural platform. India outperformed its social and economic development that brought it to become a net exporter of food. Other favorable outcomes are more than doubled life expectancy, quadrupled literacy rates, improving health conditions, and emerging sizeable middle class. India takes pride of being globally recognized corporations in pharmaceuticals, steel, information and space technologies, and yet has a louder voice on the international forum that tends to be more in keeping with its enormous size and potential.
Economic reforms in the post-1991 period brought about a salient milestone for India to become an attractive destination for foreign direct investment and technology transfer. Integration of Indian economy with the rest of the world marked new surges of large capital inflows and high rates of growth especially during 2003–2007 (Vashisht, n.d.). The global financial crisis of 2008 checked a development process. As yet, the implementation of monetary policy during the recession which accompanied the crisis caused an impact of the crisis on stock prices in India. As both regulators and rating agencies were incapable of accurately assessing the risks of newly engineered complex financial products spectrum, the number of unsecured and risky financial securities in circulation increased which triggered the financial crisis.
Economic growth in India accelerated in Fiscal Year 2015 (Asian Development Bank 2016, 2016) despite a double-digit decline in exports. It is projected to dip marginally in FY2016 due to a slowdown in public investment, stringent corporate balance sheets, and declining exports, then projected to pick up in FY2017 in consequences of newly-imposed monetary measures to strengthen banks and corporate finances, making way for a revival in investment. Notwithstanding an unexpected procrastination in enacting some economic reforms, the prospects for continued rapid growth are being unvarnished.
According to Indian Economic Statistics (Source: World Bank Indicators), some seem to undergo representing unrealistic predicaments. No one can simply make any remarks on statistics as data sources and methodologies used could not reflect facts out of the fabricated society of Indian castes. The Indian economy expanded 7.3 percent year-on-year in the last three months (fourth quarter of 2015), slowing from an upwardly revised 7.7 percent growth in the previous quarter but in line with market expectations. The manufacturing sector surged 12.6 percent while farm output shrank 1 percent.