Even as the debate continues over the feasibility of a 8 per cent growth rate during the Tenth Plan, the government has finalised a document titled Vision 2020, which says the gross domestic product can grow at around 9 per cent over the next 20 years.
If the 9 per cent growth is achieved, it will quadruple the real per capita income and reduce poverty levels to almost zero, the report says, adding that India will then attain a higher level of development than China, and will be on a par with upper-middle income countries like Argentina, Hungary and Malaysia.
The document, meant to define the country's development path over the medium term, has taken more than three years to finalise.
After drafting one document, which was scrapped, the Planning Commission is set to release a revised Vision 2020 document in December.
The report, however, takes a regressive view on employment saying that it should be considered a constitutional right of every citizen, backed by full commitment of the government.
The problems of governance that plague the country now, will continue to bother even 20 years later, the report says, adding that the lack of transparency and accountability, corruption, non-responsiveness, favouritism, bureaucracy, inefficiency, and ineffectiveness of implementation will remain in the future.
However, increasing levels of education, greater access to information, greater prosperity and rising expectations, will help mitigate these factors to some extent, it says.
Calling for a doubling of investment in education, the vision statement says, "The rate of economic growth can be substantially increased if the country becomes a superpower in knowledge and the potentials of information and information technology are fully understood and exploited."
According to the report, India needs to generate more than 160 million additional employment opportunities over the next 20 years.
With the proportion of workforce involved in agriculture expected to fall from 56 per cent to 40 per cent, the need for rapid multiplication of non-farm employment opportunities will increase, it points out, adding that tourism and infotech have the potential to generate a significant number of jobs.