Landmarks in India’s Development
1945: India, then still under colonial rule, became one of the World Bank’s founding members. Later, it was India that first suggested the creation of a special body to aid developing nations, an idea that bore fruit with the establishment of International Development Association.
1949: Not long after the country gained Independence in 1947, India took its first World Bank loan - for the development of the Indian Railways – one of the largest such networks in the world. This was the World Bank’s first loan to an Asian country and the first to be signed by a woman, Mrs Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit.
1950s: As India began laying the foundations for a modern industrial state, the World Bank helped in procuring the foreign exchange needed to set up its first power and steel plants (including Bokaro, Durgapur, Tata Iron and Steel Company). So critical were these plants for the fledgling nation that they were often called the “Temples of Modern India”. Projects also helped India upgrade the port of Calcutta – as Kolkata was then known – and supported Air India, the national airline, to expand and modernize its fleet.
1960s: When successive droughts led to chronic food shortages for India’s rapidly rising population, the World Bank worked with the country to set the stage for its landmark Green Revolution. Projects helped bring more land under cultivation and, in due course of time, this once import-dependent nation transformed into a global agricultural powerhouse and a major exporter of cereals.
Projects also supported the country’s nascent capital goods industries including the manufacture of and heavy electricals commercial vehicles.
1970s: As India intensified its focus on agriculture, the World Bank helped the country increase the availability of high-yielding seeds and fertilizers and supported the Food Corporation of India in building facilities to store food grains.
The World Bank also had the unique privilege of taking one of India’s extraordinary successes - its home-grown movement of Amul milk cooperatives - from Anand in Gujarat to the rest of the country. This remarkable White Revolution transformed the chronically milk deficient country into one of the largest producers of milk and milk products in the world.
At the same time, in keeping with India’s focus on reducing poverty, the Bank commenced its long-standing support for health and education.
1980s: Following global oil shocks, as India sought indigenous sources of energy, the World Bank supported the construction of oil and gas extraction facilities at Bombay High and the Cambay Basin, and assisted with the exploration of hydrocarbon reserves in the Krishna Godavari Delta.
With the advent of containerized cargo, projects also supported the development of India’s largest container port at Nhava Sheva near Mumbai.
1990s: When India launched pathbreaking economic reforms, the World Bank helped the country build institutions for managing critical sectors of a newly globalizing economy. These included PowerGrid, India’s national power transmission utility, which has since emerged as one of the world’s largest such institutions, and the National Highway Authority of India that has transformed highway construction across the country.
The World Bank also helped India pioneer pathbreaking reforms in rural water supply where, for the first time, local communities were involved in the planning and management of their water supply systems. Today, some 30 million people in over 30,000 villages get water close to their homes.
Projects also helped eradicate leprosy, reduce cataract blindness, combat polio, malaria and tuberculosis, and improve the nutrition of women and children. India has been polio free since 2014.
2000s: In the new millennium, when India launched a massive drive to bring every child into school, the World Bank supported its Education for All program – one of the world’s largest. The country has since brought record numbers of children into elementary school and almost all India’s children now have a primary school within walking distance of their home.
The World Bank also supported India’s national push to bring an all-weather road to every village. Since then, the Bank program alone has helped build almost 48,000 kilometers of rural roads.
With the country outlining its vision for inclusive growth, the Bank also pioneered a unique approach for improving rural livelihoods - by empowering poor rural women. From then, Bank programs have contributed to India’s National Rural Livelihoods Mission and helped bring over 77 million women into self- help groups. The approach continues to bring deep-seated change to India’s poorest regions.
At the same time, a pivotal Bank project helped ease traffic congestion in the mega-city of Mumbai by upgrading the suburban rail infrastructure and opening up east-west roads.
Projects also helped the country build back better after the devastating 2001 Gujarat Earthquake and the 2004 Tsunami.
2010s: Over the past decade, the World Bank has engaged in a series of next generation mega projects, including the construction of India’s first electrified rail freight corridor, the revival of long-defunct inland waterways, and the shift to multimodal transportation networks, helping reduce India’s high logistics costs, bind the country into a single market, and move it onto a greener growth path.
With India taking the global lead in solar energy, projects are also supporting a range of clean energy initiatives, from large scale solar parks to rooftop solar installations.
The Bank also extended support for India’s landmark initiative to end open defecation by promoting sustainable behavior change in rural areas.
The World Bank is also continuing its support for rejuvenating the iconic Ganga river and moving its management to a more comprehensive river basin approach.
