India's economic liberalisation begins
- Date
- 24 July 1991
- Category
- Economy & trade
- Region
- India
- Era
- Contemporary
- Significance
Facing a severe balance-of-payments crisis in mid-1991, with foreign reserves sufficient for barely three weeks of imports and gold airlifted abroad to secure emergency loans, India launched sweeping economic reforms. Prime Minister P. V.
Narasimha Rao and Finance Minister Manmohan Singh dismantled much of the 'Licence Raj', a dense system of state controls, by slashing import tariffs, devaluing the rupee, opening sectors to foreign investment and reducing industrial licensing. Singh's budget speech of 24 July 1991 set out the new export-oriented direction. The reforms transformed India from a largely state-controlled economy toward a market-oriented one, lifting average growth from the so-called 'Hindu rate' of around 3.5% to roughly 6% and higher in subsequent decades. Over the following thirty years the changes propelled India into the ranks of the world's largest economies, expanded its middle class and information-technology sector, and made it a rising pole in an increasingly multipolar global order alongside China.
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Empires active in 24 July 1991
- Soviet Union1922 CE – 1991 CE
- British Empire1583 CE – 1997 CE
- Portuguese Empire1415 CE – 1999 CE
- Yugoslavia1918 CE – 1992 CE
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Further reading
The wider story
The Silk Roads: A New History of the World
Best-selling world history told through the trade routes that moved goods, faiths and ideas.
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