India to become fifth-largest economy in 2025: think tank

‘To occupy 3rd slot by 2030; China to outpace U.S. in 2028’

December 27, 2020 03:33 am | Updated 03:33 am IST - NEW DELHI

Workers unload iron rods from a truck at the construction site of an educational institute on the outskirts of western Indian city of Ahmedabad August 30, 2013. Scrambling for remedies as investors' faith in India sagged, the government said last week it fast-tracked approval for a slew of infrastructure projects worth $28 billion: but the stroke of a pen in New Delhi will not be enough. The government hopes that speeding up the launch of hundreds of new power plants, highways and oil exploration blocks will breathe new life into an economy that has fallen off its perch as an emerging market high-flier. However, there is no evidence to suggest that these projects will somehow sidestep the obstacles that have hobbled construction for years - from red tape and land acquisition battles to banks' unwillingness to lend to a risk-prone sector. Picture taken August 30, 2013. To match story INDIA-INFRASTRUCTURE/ REUTERS/Amit Dave (INDIA - Tags: BUSINESS EMPLOYMENT CONSTRUCTION POLITICS)

Workers unload iron rods from a truck at the construction site of an educational institute on the outskirts of western Indian city of Ahmedabad August 30, 2013. Scrambling for remedies as investors' faith in India sagged, the government said last week it fast-tracked approval for a slew of infrastructure projects worth $28 billion: but the stroke of a pen in New Delhi will not be enough. The government hopes that speeding up the launch of hundreds of new power plants, highways and oil exploration blocks will breathe new life into an economy that has fallen off its perch as an emerging market high-flier. However, there is no evidence to suggest that these projects will somehow sidestep the obstacles that have hobbled construction for years - from red tape and land acquisition battles to banks' unwillingness to lend to a risk-prone sector. Picture taken August 30, 2013. To match story INDIA-INFRASTRUCTURE/ REUTERS/Amit Dave (INDIA - Tags: BUSINESS EMPLOYMENT CONSTRUCTION POLITICS)

India, which appears to have been pushed back to being the world’s sixth-biggest economy in 2020, will again overtake the U.K. to become the fifth-largest in 2025 and race to the third spot by 2030, a think tank said on Saturday.

India had overtaken the U.K. in 2019 to become the fifth-largest economy. “India has been knocked off course somewhat through the impact of the pandemic. As a result, after overtaking the U.K. in 2019, the U.K. overtakes India again in this year’s forecasts and stays ahead till 2024 before India takes over again,” the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) said in an annual report published on Saturday. The U.K. appears to have overtaken India again during 2020 as a result of the weakness of the rupee, it said. CEBR forecast that the Indian economy would expand by 9% in 2021 and by 7% in 2022. “Growth will naturally slow as India becomes more economically developed, with annual GDP growth expected to sink to 5.8% in 2035.”

Indian would overtake “Germany in 2027 and Japan in 2030,” it said. The U.K.-based think tank forecast that China would overtake the U.S. to become the world’s biggest economy in 2028, five years earlier than estimated due to the contrasting recoveries of the two countries from the pandemic.

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