Politics of India
India
2nd most populous nation
• Population: over one billion
• Growing at 1.4% a year
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Population (July 2005 estimate)
1,400,000,000
1,200,000,000
1,000,000,000
800,000,000
600,000,000
400,000,000
200,000,000
0
A nation of diversity: languages
• Constitution lists 14 official “principal
languages”
• English
• Hindi (30%)
A nation of diversity: religions
• Religions:
– Hindu (~80%)
– Muslim (~13%)
– others (e.g. Buddhist 0.7%)
• all major religions in the world are present
• one of the major causes of conflict
• religion can become a political vehicle for
social movement
Brief history
• One of the world’s
oldest civilizations
– 5,000 years
• foreign incursions
– Aryans, Arabs, Turks,
Portugal, France, and
Britain
– from 1,500 B.C. to 19th
Century A.D.
190 years of British colonial rule
• Informal colonial rule through the British
East India Company (1750s-1850s)
• formal colonial rule after the Mutiny
rebellion of 1857
British colonial rule
• economic impact
– trade structure
• colonial institutions
– state structure
Struggle for independence
• Indian National Congress was formed in
1885
• non-violent resistance to colonial rule
• Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948)
– transformed INC
– unity within diversity
– non-cooperation movement
• Nehru (1889-1964)
Independence & partition
• Division of the subcontinent (1947)
– India
– Pakistan
Independence & partition
• East Pakistan became Bangladesh in
1971
Republic of India
• Prime Minister Nehru (1947-1964)
• His daughter (Indira Gandhi) as Prime
Minister (1966-1977, 1980-1984)
Nehru’s legacies
• His grandson
– Rajiv Gandhi
– Prime Minister (1984-1989)
• His granddaughter-in-law
– Sonja Gandhi
– Congress party president
(1999 - )
World’s largest democracy
• Resilient democratic institutions,
processes, and legitimacy
– except 1975-1977
– Indira Gandhi declared national emergency
• politics in India is characterized by
– governments of precarious coalitions
– weakened political institutions
– political activism along ethnic lines
Turnout % in General Elections
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
1952
1957
1962
Male
1967
1971
1977
1980
1984
Female
1989
1991
1996
1998
Total
1999
Economic development
• Under Prime Minister Nehru’s rule
– private property and government guidance
– powerful planning commission
– government rules and regulations
• opportunities and incentives for corruption
– self-sufficiency
• domestic sector was protected from foreign
competition
• protected industries became inefficient
Economic development
• The “green revolution” in agriculture
– new agricultural strategy in late 1960s
– seeds, fertilizer, and irrigation
– India became self-sufficient in food
Economic development
• state-led economic development
– government-planned private economy
– substantial industrial base
Economic liberalization
• Dissatisfaction with the relatively slow
economic growth
– dismantle controls over private sector
– further integrate into global economy
• Financial crisis in early 1990s
– emergency funds from IMF & World Bank
– conditional on economic liberalization
• reduce government budget deficit
• selling government shares in public enterprises
Foreign direct investment
4000000000
3500000000
3000000000
2500000000
2000000000
1500000000
1000000000
500000000
19
70
19
71
19
72
19
73
19
74
19
75
19
76
19
77
19
78
19
79
19
80
19
81
19
82
19
83
19
84
19
85
19
86
19
87
19
88
19
89
19
90
19
91
19
92
19
93
19
94
19
95
19
96
19
97
19
98
19
99
0
-500000000
Bangladesh
India
Pakistan
Economic liberalization
• Economic performance
– average growth rate of 6% since 1990
– reducing poverty by about 10 percentage
points
– purchasing power parity GDP: $2.66 trillion
Annual Growth Rate of GDP 1961 - 1999
12
9
6
3
-3
-6
India
Pakistan
99
19
97
19
95
19
93
19
91
19
89
19
87
19
85
19
83
19
81
19
79
19
77
19
75
19
73
19
71
19
69
19
67
19
65
19
63
19
19
61
0
Economic liberalization
• India has large numbers of well-educated
people skilled in the English language
– India is a major exporter of software services
and software workers
Economic liberalization
• Government has also been considering
reducing workers’ legal protection
• unions and workers’ resistance and strikes
– oppose changes to labor laws and
privatization
Reduction of poverty
• percentage of people living in poverty has
been cut in half since 1947
• absolute number of poor people has been
rising
• very few welfare programs