India's development experince

This study of India's development experience and its lessons for the future has been in the making for nearly six years. As a study in retrospect, its purpose is to take stock and to present a basis for a fresh start in planning for India's economic and social develop ment.

Past experience in development is not itself a sufficient guide to the future. At each stage, there are new needs and possibilities and new conditions of change. Nevertheless, an understanding of facts and relationships as these have taken shape over time could pro vide valuable insights.

An evaluation of economic development is influenced inevitably by the experience of the recent past. In this sense, despite the capa cities and resources now available, the poor performance of the Indian economy during the past few years compels a re-examination of the assumptions behind our principal development policies. This is a difficult task. The total situation at any given moment of time contains a most complex mixture of economic, social, political and personal elements. These change and interact with one an other continuously, and no one individual can ever know enough to grasp the whole picture. Yet, it is apparent that, since the mid sixties, the underlying facts of the Indian economy have changed only a little. There have been larger shifts on the political scene, and there is a new bestirring of the forces of social change. To what end the energies thus released will be put remains a question.