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20 Years of Liberalization: India's Balance Sheet

When Manmohan Singh made that speech on 24th July,1991, marking the beginning of economic reforms and opening up of the Indian economy; it was little out of choice but out of compulsion. With only 3 weeks worth of reserves for import left, it was on the verge of default and had open up as a result of the IMF bailout.

To say that nothing has changed in the 20 years since then would be utter pessimism and idiotic. A lot has changed but the malice still remains in the system. The economy reached the highs of 9% GDP growth in 2007, is now the second fastest growing economy of the world and is being viewed as a major player at the world stage. But corruption, inefficiency and official laxity is still prevalent.

Recently we got a reality check on the progress on the road to reforms, when government had to rollback its decision to allow FDI in multi brand retail. Since then it has not treaded the path on any further reforms. Diesel and Kerosene still remain to be heavily subsidised. A meagre hike in rail fare was similarly rolled back.

In this 20 years we have seen big corporations entering and succeding in India. From KFC to McDonalds to Pepsi and now Volkswagen to Gucci to Apple, they are all here. The 20 years have seen several public sector enterprises fail, like the Scooter India, UTI, UPTRON etc. Several others are now struggling from Air India to FCI. This has led to a new era of PPPs (public-private partnerships). In 20 years we have achieved privatisation in certain important sectors but a lot still remains.

The Shining Stone in these 20 years have been the IT and telecom sectors which have outperformed all other sectors and have surpassed expectations. It has made India into a global powerhouse in the services sector. The cell phone has made its entry into every household(even though we have lesser bathrooms).

The Indian balance sheet of the past 20 years is both green and red. The outlook still looks good. But we need to ensure that the growth is inclusive. The per capita income has crossed Rs. 50,000 but 41.6% of indians still live at less than $1.25 per day. There have been a lot of significant developments in these 20 years and the situation is now settled with Indian companies having adaapted to the competition form MNCs or having perished in the process.

"Determination and perseverance move the world; thinking that others will do it for you is a sure way to fail"

Comments

  1. AgamMarch 27, 2012 at 4:03 AM

    gud 1

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousMarch 28, 2012 at 1:53 AM

    over the years everything changes be it life or economy of a nation.The thing that has to be noted is whether things change for better or worse.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. UnknownMarch 29, 2012 at 12:26 AM

      India is surely changing for the better but at a rather slow pace and not inclusively

      Delete

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