India’s Road To Development Still Runs Through Its Villages – OpEd
India today stands at a defining moment in its development journey. The idea of a Viksit Bharat reflects more than economic aspiration — it signals growing national confidence and the belief that the country is ready to shape its own future. India is building technological capability, expanding global partnerships and reinforcing democratic institutions. Yet the question remains central and unavoidable: can India become a truly developed nation without transforming the lives and livelihoods of people in its villages, where nearly two-thirds of its citizens still live?
In 1951, at the time of Independence, almost 83% of Indians lived in villages. It has taken half a century to reduce that share by barely ten points, and even today, urban India is yet to touch 35%. At this pace, a 50:50 rural-urban balance is still decades away.This demographic reality means villages will continue to remain central to India’s development journey. Rural India is not a periphery — it is the country’s demographic, cultural and economic anchor.
A developed nation cannot be defined only by GDP or infrastructure. It must also ensure opportunity, capability and dignity across geography. India cannot afford to replicate the path of countries whose growth concentrated in a few urban clusters. Sustained development must be built as much on rural capabilities as urban dynamism.
India’s reforms since the 1990s and technological advances of the 2000s created powerful growth engines, but rural transformation has moved at its own pace. This phase has now entered a different moment. Rural electrification, roads, sanitation, digital banking, LPG connectivity, housing and social welfare architecture have been expanded at unprecedented scale. Yet gaps remain in health, quality education, financial resilience, non-farm livelihoods and service delivery. These gaps are central to the next phase of India’s development.
The economic case for rural transformation is straightforward. Agriculture may be declining in its share of national output, but it remains the primary livelihood for many. When rural income and consumption rise, manufacturing, services, transport, housing and agritech all benefit. A nation of 1.4 billion cannot build a lasting growth model if demand remains muted in the countryside.
It is also time to retire the old binary that rural equals agriculture and urban equals industry. A resilient rural economy includes food processing, renewable energy, small manufacturing, cooperatives, tourism and digital services. The experience of COVID-19 showed this clearly: migration during the pandemic was not only the movement of workers but a reminder that local economic opportunity creates stability and dignity.
The idea that villages matter is rooted in India’s own intellectual and moral tradition. Gandhi placed the village at the centre of his vision for India. For him the village was not a relic to be preserved but a living unit of productive life, governance and social solidarity. Gandhi’s idea of Swaraj combined self-reliance, local enterprise, and participatory governance. He believed in production close to where people live, in small industries driven by local skill, and in community institutions that sustain dignity and livelihood. That village-centric vision is not nostalgic; it is strategic. It aligns with modern concerns about ecological sustainability, balanced growth and inclusive opportunity. Gandhi’s emphasis on local entrepreneurship, education, and community-led solutions offers practical guidance for shaping rural prosperity today.
Decades after Gandhi, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam translated a similar conviction into a technological framework. His PURA — Providing Urban Amenities in Rural Areas — envisioned connectivity across physical infrastructure, digital networks, skills and market access. Kalam’s point was that opportunity should travel to people, not that people must be forced to travel to opportunity. PURA anticipated many contemporary efforts — rural BPOs, digital education platforms, solar pumps, drone-enabled services, and rural start-ups — that are slowly reshaping village economies.
Policy in recent years has reflected these twin strands of moral and technological thinking. The expansion of rural roads under Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, household piped water through Jal Jeevan Mission, near-universal electricity, Swachh Bharat sanitation gains, Jan Dhan–Aadhaar–mobile financial access, and large-scale housing under PMAY are tangible gains. Schemes such as PM-KISAN, Fasal Bima, MNREGA, and the SHG movement have added layers of resilience and inclusion. More than ten crore women are now part of self-help group networks that mobilise saving, credit and enterprise at the local level.
Yet delivery is uneven. The next stage requires turning these achievements into sustainable livelihoods — more rural MSMEs, stronger agri-value chains, cold storage and warehousing, skill training that matches local demand, decentralised renewable energy, and rural clusters with better market linkages. Public policy must move from supply-driven programs to demand-led, locally owned development. Panchayats, cooperatives and women’s collectives should be empowered to design and run programmes suited to local possibilities.
Climate change adds urgency. Rural India faces water stress, erratic monsoons, floods and heat. Food security, water security and ecological protection converge on farms and village commons. The green transition — from solar irrigation to watershed restoration — will be fought and won in villages as much as in cities.
Globally, the lesson is clear: countries that invested in rural reform while urbanising tended to see more inclusive outcomes. China, for instance, undertook agricultural and township reforms that created local industrialisation before urban mega-shifts. India’s own market shifts now show rural demand emerging strongly in FMCG, financial services, housing and digital consumption, signalling the potential of an integrated growth model.
Transforming rural India is not charity. It is smart economics and wise politics. It widens markets, reduces inequality, strengthens resilience and makes growth sustainable. A developed India will not be an urban island; it will be a broad landscape of opportunity.
India’s vision of Viksit Bharat will be realised not when its tallest skyscrapers rise, but when opportunity reaches the widest geography. The true measure of development will be a nation where prosperity is broad-based, where rural livelihoods are secure, where services and institutions are strong, and where growth is not restricted to any single geography.
India’s road to development still runs through its villages. When rural India is transformed, the nation is transformed. The future of a developed India will be written not only in its cities, but also in its countryside. And when that happens, the vision of a Viksit Bharat will not be aspirational — it will be inevitable.
Like what you read?
Please consider supporting Eurasia Review. Thank you for your consideration!
SEEMS PRAGMATIC