India raring to be global economic power house
On the occasion of India's 78th Independence Day, which marks its independence from the British on August 15, 1947, India has become the fifth largest economic power in the world. India's rise to become the fifth global economic power in the world today is a testimony to India's significant progress in education, employment, agriculture, housing, medical health, industrialization, manufacturing, information technology, infrastructure, and other service sectors. India has the largest constitution in the world with 448 articles, 25 parts and 12 schedules.
While 63% of India's population lives in rural areas and 37% in urban areas, India has 30% of the world's labour force with 50% under the age of 25 and 65% under the age of 35. Similarly, today 27 crore students are studying in 15 lakh schools, 58 thousand colleges and 15 hundred universities in the country and about 40 lakh students are studying in foreign countries like America, Canada and England. Similarly, there are 3 crore central and state government employees in the country, while about 16 crore people are employed in the private sector.
India ranks first in the production of milk, pulses, jute, spices etc. and second in the production of rice, wheat, sugar, groundnut, vegetables, cotton, fruits etc. Similarly, out of 16 crore hectares of agricultural land, 19 crore people are employed in agriculture as a means of livelihood. The entire earth can be covered 117 times with 67 lakh kilometres of roads in India, similarly 23,000 trains with 1,26,000 kilometres of railway tracks carry two crore forty lakh passengers per day. The 64 crore voters who voted in the recent general elections are more than the entire population of America, Britain, Australia and Japan.
During the recent Covid crisis, India not only provided Covid vaccines free of cost to all the citizens of India but also extended them to 150 countries around the world. The largest number of UN peacekeepers is from India. And India is the biggest military power after China and America. It is well known that after the successful completion of Chandrayaan, India has also planned to launch Surya Yan soon. India has so far successfully launched 435 satellites, including 50 foreign satellites. It is worth noting that India, which has made plans to significantly reduce the number of carbon emissions by 2030 as part of environmental protection, and planning to completely eliminate the use of petrol and diesel in the country by 2050. It is a matter of pride that 35 of the world's largest multinational companies have Indian CEOs. India's budget of Rs 45 lakh crore is one of the largest in the world. It is also a matter of pride for all Indians that according to international economic surveys, India will be the third largest economic power in the world by 2030 and the first economic power in the world by 2050.
(Writer is a faculty at Sri Venkateswara University, Tirupati)