India's R&D imperative

Raising manufacturing sector's share in GDP requires a fundamental change in our national innovation system and an increase in tech investments

In the quarter century since the 1991 reforms, India's growth performance of 7 per cent places us amongst the 10 best performing economies worldwide. This is no mean achievement.  Manufacturing as a share of output, though, is just where it was in 1991 — at 15 per cent. The Make in India programme has provided welcome energy to drive our ambition of raising the share of manufacturing to 25 per cent (of the gross domestic product) by 2025, but the share hasn’t changed. I argue that achieving this goal requires a fundamental change in our national innovation system, and an