Ten charts reveal Narendra Modi’s actual record in office
NARENDRA MODI says India is now in the midst of amrit kaal, a golden age. Over the past ten years, the prime minister’s braggadocious language has proven popular with voters. Such talk will only increase as he seeks a third term in the next general election, slated to take place between April and May. But has his governance matched his rhetoric?
India’s patchy data make it difficult to assess his record. Using available sources, The Economist has created ten charts to show how Mr Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party have performed relative to the previous decade, when the Congress party led the government.
Start with the economy. Mr Modi regularly ties India’s standing in the world to its economic performance. By that measure he has a lot to boast about. India is one of the fastest growing big economies in the world. As a share of global output the country is booming (see chart 1). GDP per person, after adjusting for purchasing power, has grown at an average annual pace of 4.3% under Mr Modi, lower than the 6.2% achieved under his predecessor, Manmohan Singh, although this gap partly reflects the effect of the pandemic.
One of Mr Modi’s big promises has been to industrialise India and create higher paying jobs. But the unemployment rate has barely budged during his two terms. (It stood at 8% at the end of Mr Singh’s decade compared with 7.3% in 2022.)
The figures are worse for those aged between 15 and 24, many of whom lack the skills for India’s job market (more on that below). Youth unemployment deteriorated from 14% to 22% under Mr Singh and has not improved much since (see chart 2).
Given the importance of the rural economy (more than 40% of Indian workers toil on farms), India’s government collects regular data on rural wages. Adjusted for inflation, these have barely risen over the past decade. In 2004-05 the average rural worker earned an adjusted $3 per day. That jumped to $4.80 by the time Mr Modi took over and has remained flat ever since. Part of that is down to inflation increasing during the pandemic, but the bigger factor is probably weak economic growth in rural areas.
In judging economic progress, one metric matters more than most in India: how many people have been lifted out of poverty. Measuring that is also tricky. (The main metric of poverty has not been published since 2011.) Many social scientists instead use the UN’s Multidimensional Poverty Index, which assesses ten measures ranging from nutrition to sanitation. In 2005 some 55% of Indians were considered poor by this measure. A decade later that share had halved, to 28%. It is now at 16%. The lot of India’s poor has continued to improve, thanks to GDP growth and welfare spending.
Much of that welfare spending has come in the form of subsidies. These have rocketed since the pandemic, when the government ramped up a food programme to help people through harsh lockdowns. Despite campaigning to tighten subsidy expenditures in 2014, Mr Modi has embraced welfare spending, with new schemes and digital delivery of some payments. He has been sure to take the credit—some schemes have been rebranded to include his name.
Our sixth chart covers infrastructure. Between 2014 and 2023, spending on transport more than tripled as a share of GDP. That has helped fix many of India’s creaking roads and railways.
The splurge has not been limited to physical upgrades. Mr Modi’s government has also invested in digital infrastructure to improve financial inclusion. Around four in five Indians now have a bank account, according to the World Bank. This has improved the efficiency of welfare programmes and cut down on corruption.
In the decade to 2014 roughly 13% of electricity generated in India came from renewable sources—a share that has since increased to 23%. Mr Modi is hoping that investing in clean energy and cheap power can help draw manufacturing supply chains to India and away from China. The government has set a target of generating 500GW from renewable sources, equivalent to half the projected total capacity, by 2030. Coal still remains an important part of the mix, especially in poorer states that are heavily reliant on coal revenues.
Dirty power explains some of India’s pollution problem. Many of its cities are among the most polluted in the world. The share of people dying because of its toxic air has barely changed in more than two decades, even as other countries have managed to clean up their act (see chart 8).
Efforts to tackle the problem have been hindered by poor government policies and tussles between state and central governments over who is responsible.
Another stubborn problem is education. Today almost all Indian children go to school. The trouble is, they don’t appear to be learning much. According to data from Pratham, an NGO, only 43% of grade five students (ages ten to 11) in rural areas can read a text aimed at grade two (ages seven to eight). In 2005 the share was 53%. The rates did not improve much in Mr Singh’s term; the rate dropped more significantly under Mr Modi.
The covid-induced lockdowns play a big part in this. But much of the problem lies in pedagogy and poor governance. Teachers often do not show up to class. Those who do are administering a rigid syllabus unsuitable for many children (especially first-generation learners).
On the global stage, Mr Modi often boasts of India’s “unwavering trust in democracy”. At home, though, that faith is eroding under his Hindu-nationalist project and strongman style of governance. It has emboldened radicals and shrunk the space for dissent. Minorities—especially Muslims—have been harassed and attacked. As have activists, the press and politicians in the opposition.
All this is reflected in global measures of democracy. Researchers at V-Dem, a think-tank, estimate that India’s democracy was significantly healthier than the global average in 2014; today the two scores have converged (see chart 10). Mr Modi’s new India may be richer, but it is also more authoritarian.
Taken together, these charts reveal a mixed picture. On measures such as economic growth and poverty, India has continued to make solid progress. On others, such as infrastructure, the BJP has heralded faster change. Education, a lack of jobs and pollution remain big problems. Not quite the amrit kaal after all.■
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