The economic growth of India has been exceptionally good with strong fundamentals in terms of soaring stock markets, FII inflows, and burgeoning forex reserves. However, the extent of growth is not reflected in the overall improvement of living standards.

The Indian economy, this fiscal, has apparently achieved its utmost macro economic resilience. There seems to be enough reason to cheer in the wake of a current account surplus in the BoP for the first time in the last quarter century, a soaring stock nearing BSE-30 Sensex of 4,750 and still rising further, an expected bumper food crop in view of a good monsoon this year, an increase in exports to the tune of 18% resulting in a stronger rupee vis-à-vis US dollar, foreign exchange reserves exceeding $80 bn, an increasing trend of FDI and enhanced prospects of BPOs which would induct latest technology and provide employment opportunities to India's technically qualified human resource. In short, the macro-picture of the Indian economy appears to be extremely sound and adequate to realize Finance Minister's contemplated goal of achieving around 7 to 8% rate of growth during 2003-04.

However, looking at income generation and quality of life of India's population over the years, a quite different and duller picture emerges. At the outset, India's main asset is its burgeoning population nearing 1.2 billion. This easily renders around 500 million of adult population on the threshold of seeking employment. Will they all be able to satisfy this goal? Going backward by about three decades, we observe that the objective of employment generation which occupied a prime place in the Five Year Plan documents till 1977, subsequently faded from the latter. Since the 1980s, there has been a marked decline in the unborn organized industrial sector, and especially since the advent of economic liberalization and globalization of the Indian economy since 1991, over 3,000 small and medium-scale industries have shutdown in Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Agra and other cities of India which have rendered over 3 million people unemployed since then. Also, after the demise of the Textile Mills Industry in Mumbai during the 1980s, thousands of families have faced the brunt of deprivation and poverty and have forced even children from these families to seek jobs in the informal sector under sub-human conditions to ensure survival of their families.

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