Is Indian Economy 2012 going to become a sequel to 1991?

The Indian economy has been in turmoil since last year. The falling GDP of the nation, crashing stock markets and weak rupee are not helping the cause. The ratings agencies are already sounding the alarm bell. Filtch has already gone ahead with downgrading, S& P and Moody's are close to it. FDI is falling. Government is suffering from policy paralysis.

The big question that comes to the mind of every citizen of the nation is- “Is our country back to 1991?”

Those harrowing days when the Indian gold reserves were pledged to get loan from IMF. The national treasure had money just for three weeks worth of imports. We surely don't want to go back to those dark days of economic crisis. One man had stood tall during that time, who on account of his economic acumen made economic reforms to revive the national economy, ended license raj and hence unleashing the era of growth for us to become a trillion dollar economy. The man was none other than the then Finance Minister and current Prime Minister of India- Dr. Manmohan Singh. Its so ironic that the current crisis is happening under the government of his leadership.

India has come out of its image of the land of snake charmers with great difficulty after years of foreign misrule. We built our economy after years of toil and babysitting our esteemed democratic structures. No doubt these institutions have failed us- the common man, numerous times. The complex coalition government dynamics are leading to policy paralysis, we are yet to see a major economic reform from UPA-2. India Inc. is righteous in blaming the govt. policies for the disappointing results. FDI in retail is yet to see the light. Short term measures by RBI and Finance Ministry are failing. For the worse, manufacturing sector saw a negative growth. Gold has breached the Rs.30,000 mark but the demand is still constant. The money being used in importing this gold could have been used to fuel some growth viz investment. Gold is reducing the investments . Will the Indian citizens please pay attention to this? This is also one of the major reasons for downfall of the rupee.

The rising rupee will increase the cost of all the products that we import- automobiles, electronics items, computers, mobiles, tablets and the list goes on and on. The difference between our total imports and total exports is widening. Fiscal deficit is on an all time high. We are facing Eurozone crisis and our economy won't be left safe from its ripple effects. Demand for crude oil is increasing. All these factors are leaving for much to be asked on how to stabilize the rupee. Investing in India is being said dangerous by the ratings agencies. Unemployment is rising due to job cuts across all sectors. The BPO sector domination that we have boasting of, is being challenged by Indonesia and Philippines. IT industry is not having happy days either.

All this has been visible since quite a time now but the country's leaders are being ignorant. Planning commission has been busy giving just politically correct statements instead of taking steps to boost growth for the long term. The turnaround is far from here. The question is still unanswered- “Is our country back to 1991?”.