Ok I will bite. I travel to India once or twice a year for both pleasure and business. I can only tell you what I feel and see. I see incredible infrastructure changes even though India still has long way to go compared to other developed or even developing nations. Tons of airports being built and improved. Many highways being built and even completed in last few years.

"changed the calculation method to measure the length of highways."

Do I think Modi Govt doesn't manipulate some data ? Oh you bet they do. But I see real progress regardless and you cannot just throw some stats to change my mind. I see progress and I commend it and welcome it. Most people who live there don't care that Govt is manipulating how they measure the length of highways. They see that highways are being built. Congress didn't do shit for decades when my parents grew up in real shit 3rd world infrastructure. We are much better off in last decade or so.

I will agree with you that India has a long way to go but change is happening no matter how slow.

As per govt, out of 140 crore Indians, 80 crore rely on government for free food. That is 57% of Indians need government help for free food. [1]

If You Earn Rs 25,000 (USD 300) Per Month, You're Among India's Top 10% Income Earners [2]

>> I travel to India once or twice a year for both pleasure and business. I can only tell you what I feel and see.

You may be able to travel to India and got 1 USD converted to INR 80, then may be its a win for you, but not for other Indians. I am not sure, but you might have been able to afford somewhat better way to travel/stay/eat than most of the Indians can. So what you feel and see might not be closer to reality for most of Indians.

>> I see incredible infrastructure changes...

So if a few private companies own most of India's infra, and building shopping malls, or if few politically connected builders building high rise buildings, or if roads/flyovers being built by private companies for which public will pay toll through their noses for years to come, then in my humble opinion, this is is not real development that you should give credit to the government. This is indeed the failure of the government.

>> Tons of airports being built and improved.

Government did sell a number of already built airports to Adani. Now Adani may make it a shiny new airpot and start charging fees for everything in airport but I don't see it as an achievement of Government. [3]

[1] https://news.abplive.com/news/india/cabinet-decision-80-cror...

[2] https://www.indiatimes.com/news/india/if-you-earn-rs-25000-p...

[3] https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/transportation...

The government changed the highway measuring methodology in 2018 [1].

Under new methodology, highway stretch built = Number of lanes * kilometer stretch.

This is actually the international standard. However, when the current government compares itself with prior government, it compares apples with oranges: new methodology numbers versus old methodology numbers.

[1] https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/now-new-concept-to...

Indian highway engineers still can't figure out how to design exists and have consistent road markings/safety signs. Let them come up with a standard or enforce the already existing one first.

Very rare to see slip lanes even in normal roads of Tier 1 cities.

Just laying down asphalt isn't building highways.

The rupee is falling until it doesn’t and reverses course. The rupee falls because of numerous reasons primary among them being increased imports of oil and gas due to high growth. Increased exports have just started showing up in the numbers as India exported $750bn in exports for the first time ever. With the work on solar (go read about the progress of international solar alliance and the work done in Gujarat etc), hydrogen, EVs, flex petrol, etc the demand for oil and gas will only go down in 5 years.

India’s economy is getting a push as is clearly visible from some indisputable numbers like the digital transactions, sales of cars, homeowners count, etc. It’s just that all sources of income are not yet formalized in the huge country that is India so there is some extrapolation that needs to be done.

The Guinness book has recognized the Indian govt’s work for the most kilometers of roads constructed in a day and the new methodology is in use in other countries like the US as per the Minister, then it means the foreigners must be okay with manipulated numbers.