First Vietnam, and now Bangladesh!

 According to the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) latest World Economic Outlook report, "India is about to slip below Bangladesh in per capita gross domestic product (GDP) in 2020 (calendar year) as a result of lockdown impact. The IMF sees India's per capita GDP (in dollar terms at current prices) falling to $1,877 in 2020, a decline of 10.3 percent. For Bangladesh, the corresponding figure is seen growing to $1,888, a rise of 4 percent." Though India was far ahead till a few years back the gap has been closing because of soaring exports, savings and investments of Bangladesh. Thankfully for our ego, "On 'more appropriate' economic metric Bangladesh has not surpassed India and is unlikely to be in the future, former chief economic adviser (CEA) Arvind Subramanian said on Saturday." "The former CEA said there is need to measure real GDP in local currency after taking out effects of inflation and then, convert all local currency estimates of real GDP into comparable dollars." A bit of hocus-pocus, by using exchange rate of the rupee, never goes amiss. In June, "Importantly, according to the RBI's (Reserve Bank) real effective exchange rate (REER) index, based on the export-weighted average of 36 currencies, the rupee was 'over-valued' by almost 16% in April, despite the depreciation in recent months. The domestic currency had remained overvalued by just over 16% in FY19 (financial year) and close to 20% in FY20%, according to the index." In September 2020, the RBI hinted that it will use the strength of the  rupee to control inflation by lowering prices of imports. "The reason behind the rupee's sudden appreciation is the extent of foreign capital that is coming in, in the form of both institutional and direct investments (FIIs and FDIs)," wrote Karan Bhasin. Imported inflation is due to a steady rise in customs duties "with the government trying to protect domestic industry". Female labor force participation rate is 36% in Bangladesh compared to 20.3% for India, mortality rate due to unsafe water and sanitation is much lower in Bangladesh and it is far ahead of India in gender parity rankings, wrote Misra and Iqbal. "Bangladesh is doing well because it's following the path of previous Asian tigers. Its slice of low-skilled goods exports is in line with its share of poor-country working-age population," wrote Andy Mukherjee. "India, however, has gone the other way, choosing not to produce the things that could have absorbed its working-age population of 1 billion into factory jobs." "After World War II the 'Asian miracles' -- first Japan, then Taiwan and South Korea, most recently China -- built themselves into manufacturing powerhouses" by growing their exports by an average of 20%, wrote Ruchir Sharma. "Vietnam has sustained a similar pace for three decades. Even as global trade slumped in the 2010s, Vietnam's exports grew 16% a year, three times the emerging world average." Per capita GDP of Vietnam is much higher than that of India. Why compare? Let us bury our heads in sand.