The glories and agonies of India’s central planners

In 1985, the year Mikhail Gorbachev took over as head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, India published its seventh economic plan. Its preface said planning was a “precious gift” from Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, who had been an admirer of Soviet economics. Inevitably, the goals of the document, which included ending poverty by 2000, were missed by a country mile as India slipped towards a crisis that prompted it to open up its economy in 1991.

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