Survey unveils confident India PRIYA RANJAN DASH

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In this year’s eco nomic survey, you get to read the story of an economy that is quite different from what you hear from the rest of the world
The Indian economy is most definitely bruised by the global recession, but stands confident of growing at the fastest pace in the world by March next on its own domestic strength
The $1-trillion-plus economy grew 6.7 per cent, the second fastest after China, in 2008-09. This was in sharp contrast to the global contraction, particularly in OECD and other emerging economies
It could grow by about seven per cent this year
The World Bank has projected India to surpass China and become the fastest growing economy in 2010
The Indian economy has acquired a unique place in the world, primarily on account of its successful growth run of the past five years at an average of 8.8 per cent. The slowdown of 2.1 percentage points in 2008-09 may be only a blip that does not mark a halt to the growth story
It all boils down to India’s vastly expanded domestic market in the past five years and a strong investment rate of 40 per cent of GDP, drawn primarily from a high domestic savings rate of 38 per cent. The two together ensure that the economy grows at over 7 per cent in the normal course
Despite India’s slowdown last year, the consumer market absorbed 14 crore new telephone connections, over 15 lakh passenger cars and around 75 lakh twowheelers
The automobile industry has had an annual growth of 11.5 per cent in the past five years and telecom industry 30 per cent
Indian markets were no doubt hit by the global financial tsunami, and plummeted from the stratospheric levels to the shallows between January and October last year
However, since last March they have recorded the smartest rise among all global bourses. At Thursday’s close of 14,658, the BSE benchmark Sensex has seen more than threefold increase in the past five years. During 2008 indices went down across Asian markets, with the SSE Composite Index (Shanghai) falling 65.4 per cent to 1,821 December last year
The fall in Sensex was lower at 52.4 per ce