Indian Economy
Huge, dynamic and progressively expanding, the economy of India is characterized by a large workforce operating in many new sectors of opportunity.
The Indian economy is as diverse as it is large, with various major sectors including agriculture, manufacturing industries, textiles and handicrafts, as well as services. Agriculture remains a major component of the Indian economy, since more than 66% of the Indian population depends on it for livelihood.
The service sector is also significantly expanding and has started to assume a progressively more important role. The fact that the English speaking population in India is getting larger by the day has led India to become a hub of outsourcing activities for some of the major economies of the world like the United States and the United Kingdom. Outsourcing to India has been principally in areas like technical support and customer services.
The government plays an important role in controlling the Indian economy and there still persists a great inequality between the rich and poor. According to the ranking system and the exchange rate of the United States Dollar, the Indian economy is the 12th largest in the world.
In the year 2008, Purchasing Power Parity GDP for India was 1.5 trillion US Dollars. India’s per capita income is 4,542 US Dollars in context of Purchasing Power Parity. This is mainly due to the 1.1 billion population of India, the 2nd largest in the world after China. The World Bank classifies India as a low-income economy.
Recent trends have been showing India exporting the services of numerous information technology (IT) professionals. IT professionals have been required for their expertise in software, software engineering as well as other financial services; owing to the high skill levels of the IT professionals in India.
Other areas in which India is expected to progress include manufacturing sector, pharmaceuticals, aviation, construction of ships, biotechnology, retailing, tourism, nanotechnology, and telecommunications. Growth rates in these particular sectors are expected to rise dramatically.
Influenced, to an extent, by the Socialist movements, the Indian government has taken an economic approach. The Indian government has maintained a high & authoritative level of control over certain parts of the Indian economy like the participation of the private sector, foreign trade and foreign direct investment.
It is to be noted that in spite of the tremendous debate as regards the justification of the privatization of industries traditionally owned by the government, the process of privatization still continues at a steady pace.
One of the major challenges for the Indian economy is to remove the economic inequalities that are still continual in India after its independence in the year 1947. Poverty is still one of the major concerns although these levels have dropped notably in the recent years. As per the official surveys, it has been seen that in the year 2004, almost 27% of working Indian populace was living below poverty line.
Poverty is still a major challenge that is becoming increasingly important in relation to the alarming rate of new births in India. This implies that an even more rapid change and/or birth control policies like the ‘One Child’ policy adopted in China, need to be implemented in order to reduce the large numbers affected by the poverty in the vast Indian economy.
| 