DBWI: India not the world's second largest economy

As we all know, the Republic of India is the world's second largest economy and is expected to surpass the United States of America in the next few years with many talking of the 21st Century as the "Indian Century", but what if India wasn't the world's second largest economy? What PODs might be needed for that? Have the Gang of Four not take over the PRC (even today, the Second Republic of China is still recovering from the Gang of Four's misrule)? India not adopting economic reforms in the 1970s?
 
India adopting a much more hardline socialist inspired policy or China opening up the economy much more and much, much sooner (rather than 5 years ago) would have led to either India's economy being smaller, or China's being a lot larger than it is today.
 
So, why do you think is India the world's second largest economy, then?

they made good economic reforms at the right time i guess. Instead of potentially remaining an insular economy, they moved towards becoming a proper free market economy whilst retaining the appropriate protections in certain areas. Also starting to get good international relations with the U.S. U.K, France, Germany, Australia, Japan and other asian nations certainly helped their textiles industry greatly at the time. This probably saw them overtake China as the world's major manufacturer of clothes and by the 80's, they became the choice for manufacturing products in general.

Now, I guess having major commercial centers (think about it, Karachi, Lahore, Delhi, Mumbai, Calcutta and Dhaka all have populations of over 10 million and are all in their own right, major centers of trade and commerce) would help, especially when you compare it to a similar sized country in China (where cities have developed, but the big cities are really Shanghai, Beijing and some of the cities in that Pearl River Delta region). I suspect though that is a by-product of the countries success though, still, having that many centers of trade has made India a lot more attractive to investors over the years as they have options in where to invest. The fact that it was open to that investment (i mean their were restrictions but at least it wasn't closed of like China) did a lot.
 
So, what about the possibility of Partition going through as a way of nipping India's economic prosperity in the bud?
 
So, what about the possibility of Partition going through as a way of nipping India's economic prosperity in the bud?

Oh man, it would had hurt. The lands the AIML was and still is suggesting for an independent Muslim state is chock full of natural resources and minerals.
 
So, what about the possibility of Partition going through as a way of nipping India's economic prosperity in the bud?

if Churchill's partition plan went through, oh boy....... That would have done a lot of damage short term and long term. If Jinnah's plan of a muslim state came to fruition, you would have people moving all directions and unmitigated chaos in general. Combine that with trying to rebuild and restore and reform government and that's a lot of resources wasted. Not to mention, India wouldn't have access to some resources due to it now being a part of the muslim state.

The fact that they avoided Partition probably did a lot of help for the economy to be honest.
 
So, what do you think would be PODs to get China to be the world's second largest economy? The Gang of Four not winning out in the post-Mao power struggle?
 
So, what do you think would be PODs to get China to be the world's second largest economy? The Gang of Four not winning out in the post-Mao power struggle?

This, or making sure he doesn't get in at all. If Mao isn't there and you get a moderate in, they'll probably reform the economy sooner than here.
 
This, or making sure he doesn't get in at all. If Mao isn't there and you get a moderate in, they'll probably reform the economy sooner than here.
A China where Zhu De or Zhou Enlai was the "Great Helmsman" instead of Mao would have probably adopted Soviet-style reforms after either Zhu De or Zhou Enlai died.
 
A China where Zhu De or Zhou Enlai was the "Great Helmsman" instead of Mao would have probably adopted Soviet-style reforms after either Zhu De or Zhou Enlai died.

Nah, probably Deng Xiaoping provided he takes over instead of Mao.

As it is, Mao hated his guts and was wary of him for good reason, the man was popular.
 
So, why do you think did the USSR open up unlike the PRC?

Leadership knew it was unsustainable if they wanted to grow and prosper. I think Khurschev saw it also as much as people like Brezhnev didn't want to (too set in wanting to be this ultimate Stalinist state). He also didn't waste time when he found out about the coup against him either, which meant that they had no hope of coming to power again (i mean how can you when you get sent to a camp in Siberia).
 
So, what do you think of those people saying the 21st century would be an "Indian Century" like how the 20th century was the "American Century"? Are they correct or not?
 
Depends. Some areas are more profitable than others You guys think dumping Bengal might increase or decrease the average income level of the rest of the country? Wasn't too much of a problem when Assam went. Ahhh, a Feminist, Baptist plurality federation. Then again, Assam increased in GDP a decade or so after independence, due to the popularity of the area for Christian and women tourists. Just a shame about all the Maoists skirting along their borders...
 
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