Why not No. 1?

The IMF projection of India's nominal GDP for 2025-26 of $4,187.017 billion, against Japan's $4,186.431 billion, ($586 million or Rs.5,011 crore more), is going to make India the fourth largest economy in the world, pushing Japan to fifth position. The three countries ahead of India are the US ($30.5 trillion), China ($19.2 trillion), and Germany ($4.74 trillion).

- BY P. S. M. RAO

Despite the nuanced objections, such as 'the figures are only projections and subject to revisions,' it made Indians feel proud to hear B.V.R. Subrahmanyam, the CEO of NITI Aayog, when he talked of this achievement. He was right, prima facie, since the projections were those of an important international agency; there was every reason for jubilation all around. Further expectations are that India will ascend to third place with a 5.5 trillion-dollar economy in 2028, overtaking Germany.

Unfortunately, we are happy with these projected places while the right place of India should be number one, not third or fourth, simply because it has the largest population in the world; our share in wealth and income should be about 18 per cent of the world, commensurate with our population share. Now it is time to come out of the euphoria the projections generated and to look at the facts dispassionately; after all, the honest admission of truth is an essential prerequisite for designing a path to achieve our rightful place. What we need to gauge is threefold:

i) whether the growth numbers were correct;

ii) if correct, was there sufficient growth to gloat over so intensely? And

iii) if sufficient, was the growth alone sufficient to achieve social justice?

Also, we need to ask ourselves how well the lives of the masses were improving while the economy was scaling from height to height, as claimed. First, let us size up how big the achievement was in comparison to Japan, the country India is said to have surpassed.