Is India under-investing in infrastructure?

Yes. Whilst public expenditure is kicking in, the key reason is the decline in private investment

It is useful to start with a refresher. The chart below provides a historical perspective.

In the first half a century after Independence, India invested around 3.0% of its gross domestic product (GDP) in infrastructure, which resulted in the tattered state of the sector till quite late in the 1990s.

Realisation dawned from around 1997, that to keep pace with growth realities and aspirations, investments in infrastructure needed to be substantially stepped up — and that too with a large dose of private capital, popularly called PPP (public private partnerships). In fact, emergent markets with high economic growth have typically invested at