India, April 4 -- When we got Independence in 1947, the British Empire had totally impoverished us. We had a record poverty rate; low rates of industrialization and we were low on ideas. To make matters worse, we adopted a doomed socialistic and Licence Raj system. Nobody gave us much of a chance and expected India to disintegrate and become failed state. (To some degree, they still retain that mindset even today)

The first real crisis came in the 1950s and 1960s. Food shortages and starvation. The Bengal Famine of 1943 which killed up to 4 million and triggered by the British Empire was on everybody's mind. But in the 1960s we ushered in a Green Revolution. We finally started using fertilizers and pesticides, modernized farm tools and i...