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At 75, India is finally ready to join the global party

With its entrepreneurial spirit and an increasingly efficient welfare state, the country can thrive in a slowing world

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Ruchir Sharma

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India marked its 75th birthday yesterday, no richer relative to the rest of the world than it was at independence, but very much on the upswing.
India started out as the world's sixth-largest economy, fell to 12th by 1990, and has since staged a comeback - to sixth place. Its average income was 18 per cent of the world average at independence, but that figure fell until the early 1990s, before climbing back up - to about 18 per cent.
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