Name: Anshul Sharma
Country: India

Year: 2016
Volume: Volume-1, Issue-2 (July-December)
Page Number: 10-23

India, home to almost one-sixth of the global population, is one of the fastest growing emerging economies today. Last 70-years of independence have seen many changes in India’s Socio-economic landscape which has led India to emerge as Asia’s third largest economy. Our development efforts today face stumbling blocks in tackling poverty in the presence of high inflation. This research paper tries to review India’s growth story and development issues in light of Gandhi’s economic model and his philosophy of trusteeship. India has grown as a planned economy since independence. The first few plans focused on growth with strengthening of the manufacturing sector emphasising heavy industries to form the backbone of the economy. The objective of India’s development strategy has been to establish a socialistic pattern of society through economic growth with self-reliance and poverty alleviation to be achieved within a democratic political framework. This happened in two phases where both public and private sectors co-existed in pre-liberalisation and post-liberalisation era characterized by NEP. Over the years India has witnessed a changing composition of its economic structure: agriculture which initially comprised of 60 per cent of the GDP now comprises around 26 per cent of GDP and services comprise a massive 75 per cent of the GDP growing from 30 per cent in the 1950s. The landmark changes in 1991 were, rather, brought about in India under pressure from IMF and World Bank when India was left with foreign exchanges to barely support two weeks imports. Talking of poverty in India primarily three measures are in use:
• The poverty line (identification)
• The poverty gap Index (depth)
• The squared poverty gap index (inequality among poor)