Check out the per capita GDP of India in 2014-2015. It is comparable to large parts of Sub Saharan Africa so it should not be surprising that the human development is on par with that. And this is after the GDP growth of the last 10-15 years. More growth is needed to first raise those GDP levels to those of China or Brazil before you can start comparing India to those nations.
As for the litany of other concerns raised in the article, how can one blame the BJP or its model of growth when Congress has basically been in power for all of India's history. Hell, one of Modi's slogans has been "toilets, not temples" so obviously he recognizes the very huge issue of open defecation. It's Congress that hasn't done anything about it.
Moreover, it is the Congress that believes in a planned economy with subsidies for every little thing including diesel and kerosene (which almost bankrupt India in 1991) as well as the subsidies for fertilizer. The BJP wants to reduce/ get rid of the subsidies for petroleum products but guess which party blocks them: Congress. Getting rid of petroleum subsidies would actually be a very good thing for the Indian economy and is another needed economic reform. And only the BJP is serious about it. Also, why should teachers actually teach when they basically can't get fired and don't have to perform in order to get paid due to protection from their union?
Oh as for the informal sector which is the cause of the labor issues you see in India, it is the result of the strict and inflexible labor laws that are in place. If an employer with more than 50 employees can't fire an employee and has to follow a litany of regulations and deal with red tape and bureaucracy, it creates an incentive for businesses to remain small and creates the informal sector you see today in India. I don't know what the solution to that is, but establishing at will employment would be a good start.
And finally, India's condition cannot be blamed on just inequality of income since if you look at the GINI index, India is less unequal than the U.S., China and Brazil. Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya are economists with good ideas on how to grow the Indian economy in an inclusive way. Amartya Sen is just better at complaining and trying to justify his Marxist ideology against the avalanche of evidence to the contrary.
Amartya Sen isn't Marxist, that's a bizarre statement. He's staked out his career as public intellectual by writing books that laud markets, trade etc. He's very much a "liberal", albeit a left-liberal in the vein of Rawls. His critique is fair-minded and he's very critical of India's manufacturing malaise, which is partially rooted in a history of terrible labor laws in Indian regions that have militant labor movements. The book wasn't written as some polemical piece against the BJP, nor did I ever claim that it was, so I'm not sure why you're treating my post as if I'm some shill for the INC. However, I think that the critique of the BJP is implicit and contained within it. If you want to understand my argument: read the book and read the quote I posted from the review a little more closely. It is one thing to argue that India needs to develop but development pathways matter and India's development pathway has neglected to remedy the most appalling characteristics of extreme poverty: its effects on health. India's life expectancy is far lower than Bangladesh's life expectancy, it has failed to make investments in health infrastructure, even neglecting the importance of flush toilets much less clean drinking water. While Modi was shilling for his high-tech city, a massive subsidy for corporations, he could have just as easily focused on human development in the form of improving health metrics or educational outcomes. He has done neither: Modi's "toilets not temples" stance came in the form of banning public officials from running for office if they did not own a toilet, which is symbolic/useless and elitist.
Look man, I'm a democratic socialist but I check this at the door when I discuss development economics because I'm rather unconcerned about increasing inequality so long as it is coupled with rapid development; eliminating extreme poverty doesn't require "distributive justice", it requires the fruits of modernity, which are grown by increasing levels of capital inflows and eliminating trade barriers. However, this condition, while necessary, is not sufficient nor is it desirable for its own sake. Developing countries still need to make massive investments in education, healthcare, infrastructure that undergirds both etc. Furthermore, social safety nets play a key role in unleashing the human capability, allowing for farmers and informal sector employees alike to make rational/informed decisions about savings and investment without facing the cognitive blunting that accompanies the anxiety of economic insecurity. I'd go further than this and argue that radical measures such as land re-distribution or the creation of state-owned development banks can play a major role in increasing yields, mechanizing agriculture and freeing up labor for the manufacturing sector.
Modi's model is far too dependent on liberalization. That's all well and good but the creation of an efficient and expansive public sector is also crucial for development economics; all too often, right-wing economists are prone to forgetting that there's a direct correlation between development and levels of taxation or development and public sector spending. This correlation exists because modern economies cannot exist without the creation of transformative and enduring institutions; public education, public higher education, hospitals etc.
Note: it goes without saying that I hate Modi, who I think is a despicable fascist thug, but I hope India succeeds, I really do.
