the rest of the world had better hope that modis ambitions of high growth are fulfilled a few days ago when talking to an the assembled chief ministers of indias states prime minister narendra modi declared that he wanted india to be a 5 trillion economy by 2024 when he once again faces reelection this would he said be challenging but achievablemodi could never be accused of lacking ambition but the fact is that getting indias gdp to 5 trillion in five years will be far more challenging than achievable india is currently a 28 trillion economy to reach the 5 trillion mark by 2024 the economy would have to grow at over 12 a year advt to put this in context in the last quarter for which data is available india grew at slower than 6 and if you believe the modi governments own former top economist that data is flawed and india may well be growing a few percentage points less than thatindia could and should aspire to doubledigit growth without sustained growth at that level it has little hope of employing the roughly one million young people who join its workforce every month and unless it takes advantage of its current favorable demographics it is never likely to emerge as an uppermiddleincome economy with a prosperous and thriving middle classbut the prerequisites for the kind of growth that transformed the fortunes of the asian tigers and then china have not yet been put into place supportive markets for land and labor simply do not exist energy supply and infrastructure are far better than they were but still not up to the standards required to build a worldclass manufacturing sector and although successive governments have paid lip service to the need to educate young indians and provide them with the vocational skills they need to succeed in a modern economy the outcomes of various attempts to do so have been frankly disappointing advt if india does very little a businessasusual scenario it will indeed continue to grow growth will be moderate by indian standards between 5 to 8 on average and more often around 6 if it does in fact grow at 6 a year then the indian economy will hit 5 trillion in output a decade from now twice the time that modi wantsit will also be a very different economy and country from others of that size the india of 2029 if it is still growing at 6 will be vastly unequal not just in terms of personal income and wealth but between regions some parts of india the southern peninsula the national capital of delhi and the coastal regions of gujarat and maharashtra may by then have achieved relatively welloff middleincome statusbut the vast hinterland of india which is also incidentally where population growth is highest will remain poor these are the areas that have for the past two general elections determined the composition and