The Digital India campaign launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on July 1, 2015 has played an unprecedented role in transforming the lives of Indians.
Digitisation is improving productivity, creating new businesses and aiding the emergence of a more efficient economy. Today, more than half of India’s population uses smartphones and digital wallets. Not just that, India’s G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant wants to take India’s model of digital revolution to the rest of the world, which is struggling and gasping for growth while India gallops.
The vital statistics of the economy bear testimony to this fact. The recently released data by the Government of India shows that the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) stood at 5.6 per cent in February while it was 5.2 per cent in January.There has been some relief on the inflation front as well. In March, retail inflation was at a 15-month low of 4.79 per cent, compared to 5.95 per cent in February. In January, it had reached its highest level in three months at 6.52 per cent, but vegetable prices declined by 8.51 per cent in March. A favourable domestic policy environment, coupled with the Government’s continued focus on structural reforms, has kept domestic economic activity in India on a strong footing. It is because of the efficiencies brought into the system that while many countries are struggling to recover from economic slowdown, India continues to be the fastest-growing economy despite multiplicity of challenges. The kind of economic shocks that sometimes make it very difficult for other countries to recover, in that too, India not only faces the situation but also manages to keep its pace steady.
Although the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has reduced India’s economic growth forecast for 2023-2024 from 6.1 per cent to 5.9 per cent in its latest assessment, the change is not very big. It is in keeping with the forecast for the global economy, for which the IMF has downgraded growth estimates for 2024- 25 from 6.8 per cent to 6.3 per cent. Due to the ups and downs taking place on the economic front, given the challenges arising in production and services globally, signs of recession are evident across the world. In fact, India, too, needs to be alert to the signs of economic recession and constantly monitor steps to stregthen the economy. Efforts will have to be made to improve the current situation on employment front. The beauty of the Indian economy is that it has the ability to handle itself in precarious situations. But it is a healthy development that various steps are being taken continuously to keep the economy strong, even at the level of the Government.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has said that the pace of the Indian economy will be maintained amid the IMF and World Bank’s projections of India being the fastest-growing major economy in 2023. Regarding economic slowdown, Union Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Minister Narayan Rane had said recently that if India were to face a situation like that, the Centre was well prepared to handle it. While several developed countries are facing the possibility of recession, the Modi Government is making all possible efforts to ensure that India remains unaffected.
