Beyond 6.5%: Rethinking India’s Growth Path To 2047

To do so, a policy dialogue was organised in collaboration with Chintan Research Foundation (CRF) to bring together policymakers, subject matter experts, and thought leaders to unpack the central theme of sustained, inclusive growth. The session titled India’s Growth Story Beyond Budget: Navigating Mission 2047, became, in effect, an in-depth SWOT analysis where panelists used their experience and expertise to evaluate what India was doing well, where structural gaps remain, how they can be closed, and how global uncertainties could threaten the journey.

The theme for the first session was Opportunities, Institutions, and Structural Reform. If you missed it, here are the highlights from our first set of panelists: 

Davinder Sandhu On The Consensus

“We've reached a plateau, and that plateau is 6.5%. What we do from here is not dependent on either macro or fiscal policies,” Davinder Sandhu, Chairman, Primus Partners, said, setting the tone for his point of view. “That is a necessary, but not a sufficient condition,” he explained. While he acknowledged macroeconomic stability and strong public capital expenditure, he argued that India cannot rely on fiscal muscle alone to break out of its current growth band. “It is public CapEx that is doing the heavy lifting,” he said, while private investment has yet to match that momentum.

For Sandhu, the bigger risks are structural. According to him, India needs a 25-year cross-party consensus to anchor Mission 2047, not annual budget recalibrations. Without long-term policy continuity, investors will remain cautious. He also warned that regional and intra-state inequality threatens social and investment stability. “Inequality stares us in the face,” he said, pointing to stark regional divides such as the concentration of GDP in Gurgaon relative to the rest of Haryana.

On AI, he agreed that the technology should improve productivity, but not eliminate employment in a labour-surplus economy. He was open to AI if it reduces road fatalities, but not if it takes the human out of the loop and replaces the driver. Productivity gains are welcome, he suggested, but not at the cost of large-scale labour displacement in a young, populous country. “Don’t call it Ease Of Doing Business anymore, call it the Cost Of Doing Business,” he said. Ease of Doing Business, in his telling, must become about reducing the real cost of compliance, especially for MSMEs, and not just digitising procedures.

Takeaway: India now needs structural reform, political consensus, inequality reduction, and job-sensitive AI.

Prabir De On Global Volatility

“Numbers are very optimistic, but challenges are equally very high,” Prabir De, Professor, Research and Information System for Developing Countries, said, referring to India’s ambition of becoming a $30 trillion economy with $10 trillion in exports by 2047. He talked about India’s growth story being inseparable from global volatility. “Any global incidence will have a huge dampening impact,” he said. The pandemic, geopolitical tensions, and shifting trade alliances all underscore that domestic targets depend on external stability.

According to him, India must deepen its integration into global value chains because export expansion, not inward focus, will determine long-term success. He described recent Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with the EU, US, and ASEAN as moving in the “right direction”,  noting their quality compared to earlier agreements.

He also turned the lens inward. Growth cannot be national if it is uneven. States must converge in capability and competitiveness, he argued, warning that without stronger state-level reform momentum and coordination to make “Viksit Rajya”, the 2047 vision risks remaining a Delhi-centric aspiration.

Takeaway: Export-led integration and state-level convergence are non-negotiable for 2047.

Rahul Ahluwalia On Export-Led Acceleration

“If we keep growing at 6%, we will end up close to where, say, Brazil is today… If we accelerate to 10%… the average Indian will live the life of the average European today. It’s huge,” Rahul Ahluwalia, Founder Director, Foundation for Economic Development, said, distilling the stakes into simple arithmetic. It sounds like a few percentage points, but it makes a world of difference to India’s destiny.

Ahluwalia challenged a common assumption that India’s large population automatically makes it a large market. “We are a big market only because we have 1.4 billion people. On a per capita basis, we are one of the smallest markets in the world.” The implication is that domestic demand cannot drive prosperity alone. “Every fast-growing story… has been export-led,” he said. From East Asia to China, sustained growth has come from targeting large external markets.

On inclusion, he rejected the idea that growth has completely bypassed the poor, asserting that poverty has fallen sharply and that "truly inclusive growth is faster growth". Competitiveness in manufacturing, he argued, is the missing engine.

Takeaway: India must become globally competitive in labour-intensive exports to reach 8–10%.

Sanjeev Ahluwalia On Growth Responsibility

“I do not understand this widespread anxiety in India about this ephemeral thing called growth,” Sanjeev Ahluwalia, Distinguished Fellow, CRF, said, offering a counterpoint to alarmism. By global standards, India’s growth performance is strong, he argued. But he quickly shifted the conversation away from headline GDP numbers to accountability. “What must a citizen do to add to growth?” he asked, proposing that growth must become a shared responsibility. “We should prescribe duties for growth,” he said. 

Ahluwalia’s sharper critique was directed at the structure of India’s growth model. Large industrial policies and production-linked incentives may mobilise billion-rupee investments, he suggested, but the real employment engine lies in small enterprises. “The government has to get out of the way of MSME… If I want to open a samosa shop… get out of my way,” he said, arguing that regulatory simplification at the district level would unlock far more jobs than headline megaprojects.

He was also candid about technological disruption. “There is no gain without pain,” he remarked, acknowledging that AI and efficiency gains may displace workers.

Takeaway: India’s growth requires shared responsibility, MSME freedom, and acceptance of tough trade-offs.

The second session was anchored on Trade, Resilience & Competitiveness. If the first session examined India’s internal structural reform agenda, the second widened the lens to a world in flux. Globalisation is fragmenting. Trade is being weaponised. Supply chains are geopolitical. In that environment, what does Mission 2047 need to translate into reality? 

Here are the highlights from the second panel: 

Bala Bhaskar On A Post-Globalisation World

“Economics is now defined by geopolitics. Economics is now defined by sanctions, the weaponisation of the dollar, trade policies, and tariffs,” Bala Bhaskar, former Ambassador and economist, said. He argued that the assumptions that once governed economic policy no longer apply. Traditional trade doctrines, from comparative advantage to market self-correction, have weakened in relevance. Global institutions, including dispute resolution mechanisms, have eroded. Certainty has diminished.

Bhaskar identified 2012 as a turning point in the global order — from the US shale revolution that reshaped energy geopolitics, to China’s pivot towards high-tech competition, to material innovation that altered manufacturing geography. AI, he added, could permanently redefine production patterns. 

Yet he did not frame this purely as risk. “Free trade agreements are not going to change the business; it is we, who have to change,” he said. “Signing FTAs is insufficient without building standards, intellectual property, technological capability, and supply chain depth.” 

Takeaway: The global order is now geopolitically driven. India must build technological capability, IP ownership, and supply chain depth. 

Vaibhav Dange On Infra As Strategic Muscle

“The domestic strength of India’s economy has been the greatest advantage India has. Both in terms of consumption and capital expenditure on various aspects of the economy, infrastructure in particular,” Vaibhav Dange, CEO, Build India Foundation, said, framing his argument around resilience.

Having witnessed both the globalisation of the 1990s and the protectionist turn of the present, Dange argued that India has navigated global shocks, from COVID-19 to recent geopolitical disruptions. That resilience, he argued, rests heavily on infrastructure. Over the past decade and a half, India has dramatically expanded highways, metro systems, rail electrification, ports, inland waterways, and aviation capacity. Infrastructure capex has acted as both a growth stabiliser and a multiplier.

But the job is unfinished. Dange outlined four priorities: sustained scaling, technology adoption in materials and construction, embedding sustainability, and achieving global quality benchmarks. He also flagged urbanisation as an urgent policy arena. Nearly half of India now lives in cities, and congestion, public transport, waste management, water systems, and renewable grid upgrades require acceleration. Infrastructure, in his opinion, must shift from enabling growth to improving ease of living.

Takeaway: Infrastructure is India’s strategic muscle in a volatile world, but scale, technology, quality, and urban transformation must intensify for another decade.

Bidisha Bhattacharya On Integration Without Predictability

“If I had to summarise what is happening in the global economy right now, it would be, in my opinion, integration without predictability,” Bidisha Bhattacharya, Associate Fellow, CRF, said, framing the turbulence shaping global trade.

The world remains deeply integrated into global finance and trade, she argued — but the rules are no longer stable. Tariffs have returned. Industrial policy is back in fashion. Supply chains are geopolitical. Capital flows are volatile. The debate, therefore, is no longer about whether India should integrate into the global economy, but how to do so without becoming structurally vulnerable.

“It’s high time we move from volume to value,” she said, calling for a shift from export expansion to export promotion. The focus must move from how much India exports to what it exports. Climbing the economic complexity ladder from low-complexity commodities like rice and wheat to pharmaceuticals, engineered goods, and electronics will create deeper production ecosystems, employment linkages, and resilience, according to her. 

Takeaway: India must integrate strategically by climbing the complexity ladder, diversifying supply chains, and leveraging macro credibility in an unpredictable global order.

(The policy discussion was organised by The Secretariat in collaboration with the Chintan Research Foundation.)