Growth as a measure may have once been useful. Growth as an obsession is ruin. The future will belong not to those who consume the most, but to those who live with clarity, and who recognise that life’s worth is not measured in things.
This summary is AI-generated. Please read the full article for complete understanding.
Originally published in The Sunday Guardian on 21 sep '25.
India’s pursuit of GDP expansion fuels inequality, environmental collapse, and spiritual crisis.
Walk through any Indian city and the signs of “progress” appear unavoidable: towers pushing into the sky, shopping complexes lit through the night, and highways crowded with cars. The GDP chart rises, and we are told this is proof that the nation is advancing. Growth has become our chosen proof of destiny.
But as we step closer, the contradictions surface. The air that fills our lungs is unbreathable, rivers that once nourished are now heavily polluted, and summers burn with a once unimaginable ferocity. Inequality, too, has grown faster than prosperity. Since liberalisation, India’s economy has expanded, but so has the gulf between rich and poor, to levels unseen since the early decades after Independence. Growth dazzles at the top, while hollowing out the base.
