Deep Dive - Maharashtra pushes for $1 trillion by 2025. Is the target achievable?

Can any Indian state become a trillion dollar economy all by itself? We know there are cases where states or cities by themselves have GDPs higher than entire countries. The most well known case is California, which has a GDP of 2.7 trillion. That’s as much as, or maybe more than, all of India generates! Texas and New York also have GDPs upward of 1 trillion dollars. The Greater Tokyo metropolitan area generates $1.5 trillion. London generates half of that - around 730 billion. No Indian city or state figures near the top of any such list. Both Delhi and Mumbai hover around the $370 bn mark.

However, India’s economy is once again growing at a healthy clip. According to most reports, we‘re looking at GDP growth rates above 7% for the next few years. Unless there’s another recession, of course. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said more than once that India’s economy is on track to hit a GDP of $5 trillion by 2025. Back in February of this year, speaking at the Magnetic Maharashtra global investment summit, Modi said when India’s economy joined the $1 trillion club, it created headlines. “But later everything went down in scams and there was talk about (the) Fragile Five. Now, in the last three years, the talk has gained traction and credence that India could well join the 5 trillion dollar club.” 

This comes after Morgan Stanley published a report last year which estimated that India will become a $5 trillion economy by 2025. The Indian economy is estimated to be a $2.56 trillion economy in 2017-18.