Narendra Modi is the leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party or BJP, currently India's largest party.  Earlier this spring, the BJP won a stunning victory in India's national election, and on May 26, Mr. Modi became India's 15th Prime Minister.  On Thursday of this week, July 10, Mr. Modi's government will put forward its first budget. As one Forbes headline put it, "With High Expectations, India Awaits 'Pro-Growth' Modi's First Budget."

William T. Wilson, Ph.D., is a Senior Research Fellow in the Heritage Foundation's Asian Studies Center.  Today's quote is from an article he wrote for The National Interest, with the promising title "India Unleashed."   The article is short and punchy, and in our view does a good job at setting the stage for "The Modi Years," a drama that is just now opening.

Dr. Wilson's article begins with the promise of a strong and growing India, one that, a decade ago, seemed a real rival to China.  In his second paragraph, he notes the drop in India's growth rate from 9 percent to something in the range of 4 or 5 percent per annum.  He notes India's 9 to 11 percent inflation, and he declares "all that confidence [of a decade ago] has largely dissipated." 

We will not rehearse Dr. Wilson's full litany of challenges for the world's second-most populous country.   It is worth noting, however, that he does not see high-tech services as a long term solution to India's employment challenges.  He writes:

Where he does see promising opportunities for India is in manufacturing, provided that the necessary policies can be put in place.

We are hardly experts on Indian budgets.  We seriously doubt, however, that the larger questions can or will be answered by Thursday's budget.  The most one can hope for are some directionally positive suggestions.

Yes, Prime Minister Modi came to power nationally from his base as Chief Minister of the business friendly state of Gujarat, "the Jewel of the West."  But India writ large has wrapped itself in a cocoon of trade protections and social legislation that can make it hard place to do business.  According to Wilson, "India ranks 134 out of 189 countries" in the World Bank's 2014 Ease of Doing Business.  If you are looking for a discussion of some of those policies, you might start with the 12 pages devoted to India in this year's National Trade Estimates Report on Foreign Trade Barriers, published by USTR.

Or, to take a broader context, consider the Modi government's new demands in the WTO as the price for moving ahead on Trade Facilitation.  To quote from last Friday's edition of The Economic Times, "India has toughened its stance at the World Trade Organization...making it clear...that the country will move forward on the Trade Facilitation Agreement only when it is assured that members will also engage to work out a permanent solution to provide food security."

We may never truly understand the WTO politics surrounding the Bali agreement on Trade Facilitation.  Later this week, however, we will at least highlight more of its elements. 

With respect to India's backtracking - if that is what it is - we are not unsympathetic.  Whatever the BJP's view of the "food security" program the Singh government put in place last year, it and its politics are realities they have to live with.  And living with those realities may in turn mean causing some fresh heartburn in Geneva.  That's regrettable, but it doesn't really tell us where India is headed.  As we said, Thursday's budget won't do that either, but it may hold out some promises.  We're keeping our fingers crossed.