The International Monetary Fund’s latest World Economic Outlook has triggered much
outrage in India.

• • The provocation was the IMF’s prediction that Bangladesh’s percapita GDP will
    overtake that of India this year.
  • The projected difference is rather small — $1,888 to $1,877 — and unlikely to last
    beyond this year.

Bangladesh’s economy ‘grow’

• Women empowerment: Bangladesh has made significant strides towards educating girls and giving women a greater voice, both in the household and the public sphere.
• Support to grass-roots initiative:The Bangladesh government has supported grass-roots
  initiatives in economic inclusion.
• Digitisation: Among Bangladeshi adults with bank accounts, 34.1% made digital transactions in 2017, compared to an average rate of 27.8% for South Asia. Moreover, only 10.4% of Bangladeshi bank accounts are “dormant”, compared to 48% of Indian bank accounts.
• Successful manufacturing industry: Another partial explanation for Bangladesh’s progress is the success of its garment manufacturing industry. That is itself driven by a number of factors.
• Other reasons include:
  • Inward remittances
  • Sustained growth in agriculture
  • Growth in microfinance
  • public investment in big infrastructure projects.

Has this ever happened earlier

• In 1991, when India was undergoing a severe crisis and grew by just above 1%, Bangladesh’s percapita GDP surged ahead of India’s.