‘Hindu rate of growth’ label was product of colonial mindset, says PM Modi

“Linking the growth of the country with the faith of its people, with their identity, this was the symbol of the mindset of colonialism,” he said addressing the gathering.

“Today’s intellectuals who keep searching for communalism in all things did not see communalism in the use of the term Hindu rate of growth. This term was made part of books and research papers during their time,” he said.

He urged people to completely rid the country of the slave mentality in the next 10 years, asserting that every sector today is shedding the colonial mindset and aiming for new achievements with pride.

What is Hindu rate of growth?

Indian economist Raj Krishna coined the term “Hindu rate of growth” in 1982 to describe the type of meagre growth seen by the Indian economy. As quoted in a previous Indian Express report, Krishna used the term at a time he was teaching at the Delhi School. The term ‘Hindu Rate of Growth’  was thus “a polemical device intended to draw attention to the meagre 3.5 per cent growth rate experienced by India over the long run”.

The fact that this rate of growth remained steady through changes in governments, wars, famines, and other crises, made it for him an inherently cultural phenomenon—hence the name,” read a piece in The New Oxford companion to Economics in India.