India was a socialist country until around the collapse of the USSR when it became insolvent and the International Monetary Fund (Western nations led by the US) did its usual “we’ll give you a loan if open your market and become more capitalist like us or you can starve and die” which brought about the Indian economy of today, the good and bad.
For a more in depth look into the struggle of post colonial nations I recommend the book Why Nations Fail. It goes into how colonial powers (Britain in the case of India) left behind exclusionary institutions that screw over ordinary people and how, when freedom was attained at the end of WW2, these institutions have persisted to the present day. The difference being that local elites (those that acquiesced to colonial powers) now control them as they continue to have potentially harmful impacts.
India was a socialist country until around the collapse of the USSR when it became insolvent and the International Monetary Fund (Western nations led by the US) did its usual “we’ll give you a loan if open your market and become more capitalist like us or you can starve and die” which brought about the Indian economy of today, the good and bad.
For a more in depth look into the struggle of post colonial nations I recommend the book Why Nations Fail. It goes into how colonial powers (Britain in the case of India) left behind exclusionary institutions that screw over ordinary people and how, when freedom was attained at the end of WW2, these institutions have persisted to the present day. The difference being that local elites (those that acquiesced to colonial powers) now control them as they continue to have potentially harmful impacts.