Economic history of India
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India was one of the richest countries in the world, for about two and a half millennia starting around the end of 1st millennium BC and ending around the beginning of British rule in India.[1]
Around 500 BC, the Mahajanapadas minted punch-marked silver coins. The period was marked by intensive trade activity and urban development. By 300 BC, the Maurya Empire had united most of the Indian subcontinent including Tamilakam, which was ruled by Three Crowned Kings. The resulting political unity and military security allowed for a common economic system and enhanced trade and commerce, with increased agricultural productivity.
The Maurya Empire was followed by
India experienced per-capita
By the 18th century, the Mysoreans had embarked on an ambitious economic development program that established the Kingdom of Mysore as a major economic power. Sivramkrishna analyzing agricultural surveys conducted in Mysore by Francis Buchanan in 1800–1801, arrived at estimates, using "subsistence basket", that aggregated millet income could be almost five times subsistence level.[10] The Maratha Empire also managed an effective administration and tax collection policy throughout the core areas under its control and extracted chauth from vassal states.[11]
India experienced
From 1850 to 1947, India's GDP in 1990 international dollar terms grew from $125.7 billion to $213.7 billion, a 70% increase, or an average annual growth rate of 0.55%. This was a higher rate of growth than during the Mughal era (1600–1700), when it had grown by 22%, an annual growth rate of 0.20%, or the longer period of mostly British East Indian company rule from 1700 to 1850 where it grew 39%, or 0.22% annually. However, by the end of British rule, India's economy represented a much smaller proportion of global GDP. In 1820, India's GDP was 16% of the global GDP. By 1870, it had fallen to 12%, and by 1947 to 4%. The
Indus Valley Civilization
The
Ancient and medieval characteristics
Although ancient India had a significant urban population, much of India's population resided in villages, whose economies were largely isolated and self-sustaining.[citation needed] Agriculture was the predominant occupation and satisfied a village's food requirements while providing raw materials for hand-based industries such as textile, food processing and crafts. Besides farmers, people worked as barbers, carpenters, doctors (Ayurvedic practitioners), goldsmiths and weavers.[18]
Religion
Religion played an influential role in shaping economic activities.
Economics in
Family business
In the
Organisational entities
Along with the family- and individually-owned businesses, ancient India possessed other forms of engaging in collective activity, including the
The Shreni was a separate legal entity that had the ability to hold property separately from its owners, construct its own rules for governing the behaviour of its members and for it to contract, sue and be sued in its own name. Ancient sources such as
The Shreni had a considerable degree of centralised management. The headman of the Shreni represented the interests of the Shreni in the king's court and in many business matters. The headman could bind the Shreni in contracts, set work conditions, often received higher compensation and was the administrative authority. The headman was often selected via an election by the members of the Shreni, and could also be removed from power by the general assembly. The headman often ran the enterprise with two to five executive officers, also elected by the assembly.[citation needed]
Coinage
Punch marked
Maurya Empire
During the Maurya Empire (c. 321–185 BC), important changes and developments affected the Indian economy. It was the first time most of India was unified under one ruler. With an empire in place, trade routes became more secure. The empire spent considerable resources building and maintaining roads. The improved infrastructure, combined with increased security, greater uniformity in measurements, and increasing usage of coins as currency, enhanced trade. During this time India's share is estimated to have been from 32% to 35% of the world economy.[26]
Medieval India
The number of coins in circulation declined and instead credit arrangements predominated. Contemporary Hindu law devote increasing attention to
Villages paid a portion of their agricultural produce as revenue to the rulers, while their craftsmen received a part of the crops at harvest time for their services.[28]
Trade
Maritime trade was carried out extensively between
Other scholars suggest trading from India to West Asia and Eastern Europe was active between the 14th and 18th centuries.[31][32][33] During this period, Indian traders settled in Surakhani, a suburb of greater Baku, Azerbaijan. These traders built a Hindu temple, which suggests commerce was active and prosperous for Indians by the 17th century.[34][35][36][37]
Further north, the
Delhi Sultanate
Before and during the Delhi Sultanate (1206–1526 AD), Islam underlay a cosmopolitan civilization. It offered wide-ranging international networks, including social and economic networks. They spanned large parts of Afro-Eurasia, leading to escalating circulation of goods, people, technologies and ideas. While initially disruptive, the Delhi Sultanate was responsible for integrating the Indian subcontinent into a growing world system.[39]
The period coincided with greater use of mechanical technology in the Indian subcontinent. From the 13th century onwards, India began adopting some mechanical technologies from the
GDP estimates
According to
Year | ) | GDP per capita (1990 dollars) |
Avg % GDP growth
|
% of world GDP (PPP )
|
Population | % of world population | Period | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 33,750,000,000 | 450 | — | 32.0 | 70,000,000 | 30.03 | Classical era
| ||||
1000 | 33,750,000,000 | 450 | 0.0 | 28.0 | 72,500,000 | 27.15 | Early medieval era | ||||
1500 | 60,500,000,000 | 550 | 0.117 | 24.35 | 79,000,000 | 18.0 | Late medieval era | ||||
Alternative estimates: | [46] | [47] | [48] | [49] | |||||||
1600 | 74,250,000,000 | 550 | 782 | 682 | 758 | 735 | 0.205 | 22.39 | 100,000,000 | 17.98 | Early modern era |
1700 | 90,750,000,000 | 550 | 719 | 622 | 697 | 676 | 0.201 | 24.43 | 165,000,000 | 27.36 | |
1820 | 111,417,000,000 | 533 | 580 | 520 | 562 | 545 | 0.171 | 16.04 | 209,000,000 | 20.06 | |
1870 | 134,882,000,000 | 533 | 526 | 526 | 510 | 494 | 0.975 | 12.14 | 253,000,000 | 19.83 | Colonial era |
1913 | 204,242,000,000 | 673 | 624 | 0.965 | 7.47 | 303,700,000 | 16.64 | ||||
1940 | 265,455,000,000 | 686 | 636 | 0.976 | 5.9 | 386,800,000 | 16.82 | ||||
1950 | 222,222,000,000 | 619 | 574 | -1.794 | 4.17 | 359,000,000 | 14.11 | Republic of India | |||
1990 | 1,098,100,000,000 | 1,309 | 1,213 | 4.075 | 4.05 | 839,000,000 | 15.92 |
Mughal Empire
Economy in the Indian Subcontinent performed just as it did in ancient times, though now it would face the stress of extensive regional tensions.[50] Parthasarathi estimated that 28,000 tonnes of bullion (mainly from the New World) flowed into the Indian subcontinent between 1600 and 1800, equating to 30% of the world's production in the period.[51]
An estimate of the annual income of Emperor Akbar's treasury in 1600 is $90 million (in contrast to the tax take of Great Britain two hundred years later in 1800, which totaled $90 million). The Indian subcontinent region was estimated to be the 2nd largest in the world in economic terms in 1600, only below China.
During the time of Akbar, the
India was producing about 25% of global
Cities and towns experienced growth under the Mughal Empire, which had a relatively high degree of
Agriculture
Indian
One reform introduced by Akbar was a new land revenue system called zabt. He replaced the
According to evidence cited by economic historians
Manufacturing
Until the 18th century, Mughal India was one of the most important
The largest manufacturing industry was
Mughal India had a large shipbuilding industry, particularly in the Bengal Subah province. Economic historian Indrajit Ray estimates shipbuilding output of Bengal during the 16th and 17th centuries at 223,250 tons annually, compared with 23,061 tons produced in nineteen colonies in North America from 1769 to 1771.[81]
- Bengal Subah
Bengal Subah was the Mughal' empire's wealthiest province, globally prominent in industries such as textile manufacturing and shipbuilding.[82] and exporting silk and cotton textiles, steel, saltpeter and agricultural and industrial products. Bengal's capital city Dhaka was the empire's financial capital, with a population said to exceed one million.[83]
Domestically, much of India depended on Bengali products such as rice, silks and cotton textiles.[7][77]
- Post–Mughal Empire (1730–1818)
In the early half of the 18th century, Mughal Empire fell into decline, with Delhi sacked in
Social group | % of population | % of total income | Income in terms of per-capita mean |
---|---|---|---|
Nobility, Zamindars | 1 | 15 | 15 |
Merchants to Sweapers | 17 | 37 | 2.2 |
Village Economy | 72 | 45 | 0.6 |
Tribal Economy | 10 | 3 | 0.3 |
Total | 100 | 100 | 1 |
Among the post-Mughal states that emerged in the 18th century, the dominant economic powers were Maratha Empire, Bengal Subah (under the Nawabs of Bengal) and the South Indian Kingdom of Mysore.[86][87][88]
Jeffrey G. Williamson argued that India went through a period of deindustrialization in the latter half of the 18th century as an indirect outcome of the collapse of the Mughal Empire, and that British rule later caused further deindustrialization.[12][89] though Indian textiles maintained a competitive advantage over British textiles until the 19th century.[90] Prasannan Parthasarathi countered that several post-Mughal states did not decline, notably Bengal, Marathas and Mysore, which were comparable to Britain into the late 18th century.[91]
British rule
A year after the loss of the British
British East India Company rule
Immediately following the East India Company gaining the right to collect revenue, on behalf of the Nawab of Bengal, the Company largely ceased a century and a half practice of importing gold and silver, and for more than a decade, which it had hitherto used to pay for the goods shipped back to Britain, the American colonies, East Asia, or on to African Slavers, to be bartered for Slaves in the Atlantic Slave trade:[78]
Years | Bullion (£) | Average per annum |
---|---|---|
1708/9-1733/4 | 12,189,147 | 420,315 |
1734/5-1759/60 | 15,239,115 | 586,119 |
1760/1-1765/6 | 842,381 | 140,396 |
1766/7-1771/2 | 968,289 | 161,381 |
1772/3-1775/6 | 72,911 | 18,227 |
1776/7-1784/5 | 156,106 | 17,345 |
1785/6-1792/3 | 4,476,207 | 559,525 |
1793/4-1809/10 | 8,988,165 | 528,715 |
In addition, as under Mughal rule, land and opium revenue collected in the Bengal Presidency helped finance the company's administration, raise Sepoy armies, and fund wars in other parts of India, and later further afield, for example the Opium Wars, with additional capital raised, at typically 10%, from Banias money lenders.[93]
In the period 1760–1800, Bengal's money supply was greatly diminished. The closing of some local mints and close supervision of the rest, the fixing of exchange rates and the standardization of coinage added to the economic downturn.[94]
During this period, the East India Company began tax administration reforms in a fast expanding empire spread over 250 million acres (1,000,000 km2), or 35 percent of Indian domain, with regional land, opium and salt taxes set, and collected. Indirect rule was established on protectorates and buffer states.
During the period 1780–1860 India changed from an exporter of processed goods paid for in
The abolition of the Atlantic slave trade, from 1807, both eliminated a significant export market,[78] and encouraged Caribbean plantations to organize the import of South Asian labor.[95]
By 1820, India had fallen from the top rank to become the second-largest economy in the world, behind China.[96]
British economic policies gave them a monopoly over India's large market and cotton resources.[97][90][98]
- Textiles
In the 1750s fine cotton and silk was exported from India to markets in Europe, Americas, Asia, and Africa.[78] With East India Company supplied cotton pieces comprising approximately 30%, by value, of the trade goods bartered for Slaves in the Anglo-African Triangular trade, and featuring in the French and Arab slave trades.[78]
East India Company buyers, along with independent British, Dutch and French East India company buyers, historically competed against each other, to place pre-paid advanced orders with Bengali middlemen for quantities of cotton pieces (Bolts of cloth approximately 18 yards by one yard in size), of a specified quality, and pattern, for delivery the following year.[99] The middlemen often failed to deliver the ordered quantity, or quality, to the contracted party, with pieces purchased with one companies money, from local weavers across the region, instead sold to a higher bidder.[99] Post the East India Company gaining administrative authority over Bengal, the Company forced the local merchants to fulfil its orders before servicing those of other parties, leading to protest, both from the local middlemen and competing East India Companies.[99] As they did they after the British East India Company started dictating the price of yarn sold within the region, which had historically accounted for the majority of the cost of a cotton piece.[99] The actions though not impacting local product, financially benefitted the Calcutta administration, over the local middlemen and the competing Companies engaged in the international trade.[99]
From the late 18th century British industry began to lobby their government to reintroduce the
Year | Cotton consumption (m yds) | Domestic production (m yds) | Domestic production (1871=100) | Imports from Britain (m yds) | Exports to Britain (pieces) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1600 | 946 | 946 | 72.4 | 0 | |
1650 | 876 | 876 | 67.1 | 0 | |
1700 | 970 | 970 | 74.3 | 0 | 868,095 |
1750 | 1,098 | 1,098 | 84 | 0 | 701,485 |
1801 | 1,178 | 1,178 | 90.2 | 0 | 1,037,440 |
1811 | 1,076 | 1,075 | 82.3 | 1 | 691,640 |
1821 | 1,046 | 1,026 | 78.6 | 20 | 758,397 |
1831 | 1,139 | 1,101 | 84.3 | 38 | 287,814 |
1841 | 1,407 | 1,266 | 97 | 141 | |
1851 | 1,722 | 1,374 | 105.2 | 348 | |
1861 | 1,989 | 1,475 | 112.9 | 514 | |
1871 | 2,099 | 1,306 | 100 | 793 |
Indian historian, Rajat Kanta Ray, noted the relative decline of the Indian cotton textile industry started in the mid-1820s. The pace of its decline was, however, slow though steady at the beginning, but reached a crisis by 1860, when 563,000 textile workers lost their jobs. Ray estimates that the industry shrank by about 28% by 1850. However, it survived in the high-end and low-end domestic markets. Ray argued that British discriminatory policies undoubtedly depressed the industry's exports, but suggests its decay is better explained by technological innovations in Britain.[103] With Amiya Bagchi estimating the impact of the invention of the Spinning mule on the employment of handspinners:
Occupation | 1809–1813 | 1901 |
---|---|---|
Spinners | 10.3 | – |
Spinners / Weavers | 2.3 | 1.3 |
Other Industrial | 9.0 | 7.2 |
TOTAL | 21.6 | 8.5 |
Indian textiles had maintained a competitive advantage over British textiles up until the 19th century, when Britain eventually overtook India as the world's largest cotton textile manufacturer.[90] In 1811, Bengal was still a major exporter of cotton cloth to the Americas and the Indian Ocean. However, Bengali cotton exports declined over the course of the early 19th century, as British imports to Bengal increased, from 25% in 1811 to 93% in 1840.[106]
The second quarter of the 19th century, raw materials, which chiefly consisted of raw cotton, opium, and indigo, accounted for most of India's exports.[100] By the end of the 1930s Indian textiles, and raw cotton, jute, hemp, and silk exports exceed $200 million, annually.[107]
- Mining
Exploitable mineral deposits had started to be identified under the East India Company, with the first Coal mines, along with the Geological Survey of India established to identify and map the available resources in the territory.[108] A modern Iron and steel industry in India would be established in the Second half of the 19th century, with over 3 million tonnes of metals produced annually, and 25 million tonnes of coal, by the 1940s.[109][107]
- Roads
The East India Companies' trade, and industry enabling
- Indian ordnance factories
In 1787, a Gunpowder Factory was established at Ishapore; it began production in 1791, it is now the Rifle Factory Ishapore, beginning in 1904. In 1801, Gun & Shell Factory, Calcutta was established and the production began on 18 March 1802. There were eighteen ordnance factories before India became independent in 1947.[112]
- Paper and publishing
Under the EIC the first Indian authored publications, printed, on locally produced paper, produced in locally established paper mills, appeared, from the Hicky's Bengal Gazette, to by the 1940s, a hundred thousand tonnes of paper was being produced, annually.[107]
British Raj
The formal dissolution of the Mughal Empire heralded a change in British treatment of Indian subjects. During the British Raj, massive railway projects were begun in earnest and government jobs and guaranteed pensions attracted a large number of upper caste Hindus into the civil service for the first time. British cotton exports absorbed 55 percent of the Indian market by 1875.[113] In the 1850s the first cotton mills opened in Bombay, posing a challenge to the cottage-based home production system based on family labour.[114] Real GDP per capita grew 14 per cent during 1870–1906.
- Fall of the rupee
Period | Price of silver (in troy ounce )
|
Rupee exchange rate (in pence) |
---|---|---|
1871–1872 | 60+1⁄2 | 23+1⁄8 |
1875–1876 | 56+3⁄4 | 21+5⁄8 |
1879–1880 | 51+1⁄4 | 20 |
1883–1884 | 50+1⁄2 | 19+1⁄2 |
1887–1888 | 44+5⁄8 | 18+7⁄8 |
1890–1951 | 47+11⁄16 | 18+1⁄8 |
1891–1892 | 45 | 16+3⁄4 |
1892–1893 | 39 | 15 |
Source: B.E. Dadachanji. History of Indian Currency and Exchange, 3rd enlarged ed.
(Bombay: D.B. Taraporevala Sons & Co, 1934), p. 15 |
During the American Civil War, the US Dollar halved in value to ₹1.54 by 1864. After its victory in the Franco-Prussian War (1870–71), Germany extracted a huge indemnity from France of £200,000,000, and then moved to join Britain on a gold monetary standard. France, the US, and other industrialising countries followed Germany in adopting gold after the Panic of 1873. Countries such as Japan that did not have the necessary access to gold or those, such as India, that were subject to imperial policies remained mostly on a silver standard. Silver-based and gold-based economies then diverged dramatically. The worst affected were silver economies that traded mainly with gold economies. Silver reserves increased in size, causing gold to rise in relative value. The impact on silver-based India was profound, given that most of its trade was with Britain and other gold-based countries. As the price of silver fell, so too did the exchange value of the rupee, when measured against sterling.
- Agriculture and industry
The Indian economy grew at about 1% per year from 1890 to 1910, in line with, and largely dependent on increased agricultural output, through schemes such as the Punjab Canal Colonies, Ganges canal, and cultivation of 4,000,000 acres of Assam jungle, which the growth of land under cultivation only keptIng pace with a population that doubled in the same period.[115][116] The result was little change in Real income levels. Agriculture was still dominant, with most peasants at the subsistence level.
Entrepreneur Jamsetji Tata (1839–1904) began his industrial career in 1877 with the Central India Spinning, Weaving, and Manufacturing Company in Bombay. While other Indian mills produced cheap coarse yarn (and later cloth) using local short-staple cotton and simple machinery imported from Britain, Tata did much better by importing expensive longer-stapled cotton from Egypt and buying more complex ring-spindle machinery from the United States to spin finer yarn that could compete with imports from Britain.[117]
In the 1890s, Tata launched plans to expand into the heavy industry using Indian funding. The Raj did not provide capital, but aware of Britain's declining position against the US and Germany in the steel industry, it wanted steel mills in India so it promised to purchase any surplus steel Tata could not otherwise sell.[118]
By the end of the 1930s, Cotton, Jute, Peanuts, Tea, Tobacco, and Hides accounted for the majority of the $500+ million of agricultural derived, annual exports.[107]
- Railways
British investors built a modern railway system in the late 19th century—it became the then fourth-largest in the world and was renowned for the quality of construction and service.[119] The government was supportive, realising its value for military use and for economic growth. The railways at first were privately owned and operated, and run by British administrators, engineers and skilled craftsmen. At first, only the unskilled workers were Indians.[120]
A plan for a rail system was first advanced in 1832. The first train ran from
In 1853, the first passenger train service was inaugurated between
Headrick argues that both the Raj lines and the private companies hired only European supervisors, civil engineers and even operating personnel, such as locomotive engineers. The government's Stores Policy required that bids on railway contracts be submitted to the India Office in London, shutting out most Indian firms.[citation needed] The railway companies purchased most of their hardware and parts in Britain. Railway maintenance workshops existed in India, but were rarely allowed to manufacture or repair locomotives.[126] Christensen (1996) looked at colonial purpose, local needs, capital, service and private-versus-public interests. He concluded that making the railways dependent on the state hindered success, because railway expenses had to go through the same bureaucratic budgeting process as did all other state expenses. Railway costs could therefore not respond to needs of the railways or their passengers.[127]
In 1951, forty-two separate railway systems, including thirty-two lines owned by the former Indian princely states, were amalgamated to form a single unit named the Indian Railways. The existing rail systems were abandoned in favor of zones in 1951 and a total of six zones came into being in 1952.[125]
- Chemicals
The first refineries were established to produce kerosene, petrol, paints and over chemicals, locally, with production increasing once local deposits had been identified, to by the 1940s, sixty million gallons of petrochemicals were being produced annually.[107]
- Economic impact of imperialism
Debate continues about the economic impact of British imperialism on India. The issue was first raised by
British historian P. J. Marshall reinterpreted the view that the prosperity of the Mughal era gave way to poverty and anarchy, arguing that the British takeover was not a sharp break with the past. British control was delegated largely through regional rulers and was sustained by a generally prosperous economy through the 18th century, except for the frequent, deadly famines. Marshall notes the British raised revenue through local tax administrators and kept the old Mughal tax rates. Instead of the Indian nationalist account of the British as alien aggressors, seizing power by brute force and impoverishing the region, Marshall presents a British nationalist interpretation in which the British were not in full control, but instead were controllers in what was primarily an Indian-run society and in which their ability to keep power depended upon cooperation with Indian elites. Marshall admitted that much of his interpretation is rejected by many historians.[129]
Some historians point to company rule as a major factor in both India's
Other
There is no doubt that our grievances against the British Empire had a sound basis. As the painstaking statistical work of the Cambridge historian Angus Maddison has shown, India's share of world income collapsed from 22.6% in 1700, almost equal to Europe's share of 23.3% at that time, to as low as 3.8% in 1952. Indeed, at the beginning of the 20th century, "the brightest jewel in the British Crown" was the poorest country in the world in terms of per capita income.
Economic historians have investigated regional differences in taxation, and public good provision, across the British Raj, with a strong positive correlation found between education spending, and Literacy in India; with historic Provincial policies still impacting comparative economic development, productivity, and employment.[137]
Other economic historians debate the impact of
India served as both a significant supplier of raw goods to British manufacturers and a large captive market for British manufactured goods.[141]
- Relative decline in productivity
India accounted for 25% of the world's industrial output in 1750, declining to 2% of the world's industrial output in 1900.[12] Britain replaced India as the world's largest textile manufacturer in the 19th century.[90] In terms of urbanization, Mughal India had a higher percentage of its population (15%) living in urban centres in 1600 than British India did in the 19th century.[58]
- Productivity comparison
Stephen Broadberry, Johann Custodis, and Bishnupriya Gupta, in 2014, offered the following comparative estimates for:
Year | India ($) | UK ($) | Ratio (%) | India population (m) | UK population (m) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1600 | 682 | 1,123 | 61.5 | 142 | 5 |
1650 | 638 | 1,100 | 58.8 | 142 | 5.8 |
1700 | 622 | 1,563 | 40.3 | 164 | 8.8 |
1750 | 576 | 1,710 | 34.2 | 190 | 9.2 |
1801 | 569 | 2,080 | 27.7 | 207 | 16.3 |
1851 | 556 | 2,997 | 18.8 | 232 | 27.5 |
1871 | 526 | 3,657 | 14.5 | 256 | 31.6 |
Several economic historians claimed that in the 18th century real wages were falling in India, and were "far below European levels".[143] This has been disputed by others, who argued that real wage decline occurred in the early 19th century, or possibly beginning in the late 18th century, largely as a result of "globalization forces".[12]
Clingingsmith and Williamson[104] argue India deindustrialized, in the period between 1750 and 1860, due to two very different causes, before reindustrialization. Between 1750 and 1810, they suggest the loss of Mughal hegemony allowed new despotic rulers to revenue farm their conquered populations, seeing tax and rent demands increase to 50% of production, compared to the 5–6% extracted in China during the period, and levied largely to fund regional warfare. Combined with the use of labour and livestock for martial purposes, grain and textile prices were driven up, along with nominal wages, as the populous attempted to meet the demands, reducing the competitiveness of Indian handicrafts, and impacting the regional textile trade. Then from 1810 to 1860, the expansion of the British factory system drove down the relative price of textiles worldwide, through productivity advances, a trend that was magnified in India as the concurrent transport revolution dramatically reduced transportation costs, and in a sub-continent that had not seen metalled roads, the introduction of mechanical transport exposed once protected markets to global competition, hitting artisanal manufacture, but stabilizing the agricultural sector.
Angus Maddison states:[144]
This was a shattering blow to manufacturers of fine muslins, jewellery, luxury clothing and footwear, decorative swords and weapons. My own guess would be that the home market for these goods was about 5 percent of Moghul national income and the export market for textiles probably another 1.5 percent.
- Absence of industrialisation
Historians have questioned why India failed to industrialise. As the global cotton industry underwent a technological revolution in the 18th century, while Indian industry stagnated after adopting the Flying shuttle, and industrialisation began only in the late 19th century. Several historians have suggested that this was because India was still a largely agricultural nation with low Commodity money wage levels, arguing that nominal wages were high in Britain so cotton producers had the incentive to invent and purchase expensive new labour-saving technologies, and that wages levels were low in India so producers preferred to increase output by hiring more workers rather than investing in technology.[145]
Colonial boom
During 1906–50, real GDP per capita of India fell 5.7 per cent while that of the UK grew 45 per cent and the USA grew 111 per cent.
In 1928, 48% of the cotton spindles installed outside Europe, North America and Japan were in India (Dunn and Hardy, 1931: 25). In 1935, 50% of the steel produced outside Europe, North America and Japan was produced in India (BKS, 1950: 265–74). The Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO), headed by Dorabji Tata, opened its plant at Jamshedpur in Bihar (present day in Jharkhand) in 1908. It became the leading iron and steel producer in India, with 120,000 employees in 1945.[147] TISCO became an India's symbol of technical skill, managerial competence, entrepreneurial flair, and high pay for industrial workers.[148]
During the
Inflation emerged a national issue during the World Wars with negligible rise in real GDP. Non-royal private wealth was encouraged by colonial administrations during these times. Houses of Birla and Sahu Jain began to challenge the Houses of Martin Burn, Bird Heilgers and Andrew Yule. About one-ninth of the national population were urban by 1925.
- Economic bust
The first economic boom cycle ended with the Great Depression in India. The colonial administration did little to alleviate debt stress.[152] The worst consequences involved deflation, which increased the burden of the debt on villagers.[153] Total economic output did not decline between 1929 and 1934. The worst-hit sector was jute, based in Bengal, which was an important element in overseas trade; it had prospered in the 1920s but prices dropped in the 1930s.[154] Employment also decline, while agriculture and small-scale industry exhibited gains.[155] The most successful new industry was sugar, which had meteoric growth in the 1930s.[156][157]
Gold-Silver ratio quintupled to 100-1 during 1920-40 triggering a sterling crisis worse than the 1890s. The Bank of England records the Indian central bank held a positive balance of £1,160 million on 14 July 1947, and that British India maintained a trade surplus, with the United Kingdom, for the duration of the British Raj eg.[158]
Period | Balance of trade and net invisibles | War expenditure | Other sources | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
September 1939 – March 1940 | 65 | 2 | 13 | 80 |
1940–41 | 57 | 30 | 6 | 93 |
1941–42 | 73 | 146 | 6 | 225 |
1942–43 | 92 | 244 | 7 | 343 |
1943–44 | 105 | 289 | 3 | 397 |
1944–45 | 92 | 308 | 2 | 402 |
1945–46 | 70 | 282 | 3 | 355 |
Total | 554 | 1,301 | 40 | 1,895 |
Source: Indian sterling balances, p. 2, 15 Jan.1.1947, Bank of England (BoE), OV56/55.
Studies of the comparative tax burdens in the British Empire, by days of labour required to meet the per capita tax bill, income tax rates, and gross colonial revenues indicate the tax burden in India required approximately half the number of days of labour to meet, as that of the UK, and a third that of some settler colonies, such as New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and Hong Kong, which some economic historians speculate deprived the Colonial Indian administration of the revenue necessary to provide the public goods to accelerate economic development, literacy, and industrialisation, as experienced elsewhere in the empire.[159][160]
The newly independent but weak Union government's treasury reported annual revenue of £334 million in 1950. In contrast,
Karl Marx, writing in 1857, suggested the Nominal (Silver) per capita income of East India Company, in 1854, was approximately 1:12 that of the UK, as was the Nominal per capita tax burden 1:12 of the UK, 1:10 of France, and 1:5 of Prussia.[163] Explaining why the EIC administration was perpetually running local deficits, and in need to borrow monies in India, to fund the administration.[164]
Economic historians such as Prasannan Parthasarathi have criticized these estimates,
According to economic historian
Republic of India
Socialist period
Before independence a large share of tax revenue was generated by the land tax. Thereafter land taxes steadily declined as a share of revenues.[174]
The economic problems inherited at independence were exacerbated by the costs associated with the partition, which had resulted in about 2 to 4 million refugees fleeing past each other across the new borders between India and Pakistan. Refugee settlement was a considerable economic strain. Partition divided India into complementary economic zones. Under the British, jute and cotton were grown in the eastern part of Bengal (East Pakistan, after 1971, Bangladesh), but processing took place mostly in the western part of Bengal, which became the Indian state of West Bengal. As a result, after independence India had to convert land previously used for food production to cultivate cotton and jute.[175]
Growth continued in the 1950s, the rate of growth was less positive than India's politicians expected.[176]
Toward the end of Nehru's term as prime minister, India experienced serious food shortages.[citation needed]
Beginning in 1950, India faced
From FY 1951 to FY 1979, the economy grew at an average rate of about 3.1 percent a year, or at an annual rate of 1.0 percent per capita.[178] During this period, industry grew at an average rate of 4.5 per cent a year, compared with 3 per cent for agriculture.[179][180] Real GDP per capita grew 59 per cent during 1950–77.
Prime minister Indira Gandhi proclaimed a national emergency and suspended the Constitution in 1975. About one-fifth of the national population were urban by 1975.[181]
- Steel
Prime Minister
- Heavy Industry
India was close to Soviet Union, which provided technology assistance and transfer in the field of heavy industries such as Oil & Gas, Nuclear, Mining, Machinery, Railways, Heavy equipment, Electrical equipment etc.
- Economic bust
The second economic boom cycle ended with the 1979 oil crisis that triggered fiscal deficits through the 1980s. In 1975 India's GDP (in 1990 US dollars) was $545 billion, $1,561 billion in the USSR, $1,266 billion in Japan, and $3,517 billion in the US. Real GDP per capita grew 51 per cent during 1977–94.[183]
Capitalist Boom
Economic liberalisation in India since the 1990s led to paradigm shift in growth and structure of national income. Real GDP per capita grew 142 per cent during 1994–2013.
About one-fourth of the national population was urban by 2000.[187]
The Indian steel industry began expanding into Europe in the 21st century. In January 2007 India's Tata bought European steel maker
The government started the Golden Quadrilateral road network connecting Delhi, Chennai, Mumbai and Kolkata with various Indian regions. The project, completed in January 2012, was the most ambitious infrastructure project of independent India.[189][190]
- Economic bust
The coronavirus pandemic led to a recession in the Indian economy. Real GDP per capita grew 39 per cent during 2013–21.
For purchasing power parity comparisons, the US dollar is converted at 9.46 rupees. Despite continuous real GDP growth of at least 5% since 2009, the Indian economy was mired in bureaucratic hurdles.
See also
- Golden Age of India
- Demographics of India
- GDP of India (1–1947 CE)
- History of agriculture in the Indian subcontinent
- Banking in India
- History of India
- Indian maritime history
- List of regions by past GDP (PPP)
- List of regions by past GDP (PPP) per capita
- List of countries by past and projected GDP (nominal)
- Economic history of the Indian subcontinent
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- Majumdar, Sumit K. India's Late, Late Industrial Revolution: Democratizing Entrepreneurship (Cambridge University Press; 2012), 426 pages; focus on the entrepreneur-led revolution since 1990
- Myrdal, Gunnar. Asian Drama: An Inquiry into the Poverty of Nations (3 vol, 1968) 2284 pages; also 4th vol. on methodology (1970), focus on India and neighbors; by winner of Nobel prize in economics
- Robb, Peter (17 January 2004). A History of India. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-333-69129-8.
- Richards, John F. (1996). The Mughal Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-56603-2.
- ISBN 978-0-520-93935-6.
- Roy, Tirthankar. Economic History of India 1857–1947 (3d ed., 2011).
- Rudolph, Lloyd I. In Pursuit of Lakshmi: The Political Economy of the Indian State (1987).
- Sankaran, S. Indian Economy: Problems, Policies and Development (Margham Publications, 7th ed. 1994).
- Tomlinson, B. R. et al. The Economy of Modern India, 1860–1970 (1996) (The New Cambridge History of India)
- Ravinder Kaur (2012). "India Inc. and its Moral Discontent". Economic and Political Weekly.
- Wolpert, Stanley, ed. Encyclopedia of India (4 vol. 2005) comprehensive coverage by scholars
External links
- Infographic: Share of world GDP throughout history | Infogram
- Khanna, Vikramaditya S. (2005), The Economic History of the Corporate Form in Ancient India, SSRN 796464.
- Pearce, H. Thomas (Spring 2003). Weber's study of the Hindu ethic and the caste system.
- "Manmohan Singh's address at the Oxford in July 2005". The Hindu. Chennai, India. 10 July 2005. Archived from the original on 27 October 2005. Retrieved 10 December 2005.
- Limca Book of Records (1993). Bisleri Beverages Limited. ISBN 81-900115-6-1.
- Economic History of India Archived 2 July 2020 at the Wayback Machine Precolonial times to present.
- The IMF database.
- This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain. Country Studies. Federal Research Division.