On June 9, 2026, Narendra Modi achieved an unprecedented feat for any Indian Prime Minister: he surpassed 4,399 days in office, surpassing Jawaharlal Nehru's record. The achievement occurred in the midst of a raucous national debate not a sedate ceremony. Supporters touted it as evidence of “transformational leadership,” while critics labeled it “12 years of broken promises wrapped in rhetoric.” Both sides are partially right. That's why it's worth doing with a straight eye.

The Economy: The Numbers that Divide

India started 2014 in the ignoble company of the “Fragile Five” which are economies deemed to be the most vulnerable to a turnaround in capital flows. India's GDP is ₹345 lakh crore currently (as on 01-04-2025-26) and is fast moving towards the $5 trillion mark. This is the pattern that is in reality. The milestone that was reached after 60 years of Independence has gone into overdrive - India has reached the $2 trillion mark by 2014 and has crossed the $4 trillion mark in just a decade.

However, the overall figure tells a more complex story. If you remove the pandemic outlier, and compare the Modi period with the UPA period, the average annual growth in GDP during the NDA period over this 12-year period turns out to be approximately 5.77% against 7.74% in the UPA period (2004-14). Modi's supporters are right in noting that he came into an economy that was decelerating, weathered the storms of demonetisation, endured the impact of the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax, and then dealt with a global pandemic. There are two of those body blows, and as justifiably pointed out by critics, two of them were self-inflicted.

Demonetisation and early rollout of GST had a major impact on the informal sector which accounts for bulk of the employment in India. Though India has witnessed satisfactory headline GDP growth, critics say it has not been able to produce adequate quality jobs, particularly in the manufacturing sector. It was not a fiction that the small traders and small businessmen were disturbed and that the subsequent information on the employment in the years that followed was disturbing for the government that had taken the oath of the office on the promise of two crore jobs a year.

Banking Fix That Really Worked

The government has been solely good in the case of the so-broken banking system in India. Public sector banks were in a soup when the NDA came to power, a result of the infrastructure-lending spree gone sour. Gross NPAs of 4.4% in 2014 have been reduced to 1.93% in 2026 and the public sector banks recorded record profits of almost ₹2 lakh crore in 2025-26. That really is a sea change – and one few governments anywhere have pulled off cleanly. Regardless of the delay in the implementation of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, the code has altered the balance of power between borrowers and lenders in India. Now there is a real threat to creditors. It is of huge significance for the future of private investment.

Digital India: One reform that changed daily life"

Among all the things the Modi government has built, only the digital payments architecture is such that it impacts a vegetable vendor in Varanasi as much as a startup founder in Bengaluru. In March 2026, UPI reported almost 2,300 crore transactions valued at ₹30 lakh crore, and India now accounts for 49% of the global real-time payments market. To put this claim into perspective: At the peak, UPI in India has processed 3,729 transactions per second, outperforming China's Alipay, Paypal and Brazil's PIX in terms of transaction velocity.

December 2025 turned out to be the highest month in terms of transactions for UPI, as the number of transactions surged to 21.6 billion, and the total value of transactions reached nearly ₹28 lakh crore. This is not piecemeal, it's a full re-engineering of the way money is used by 1.4 billion people. Internet connections increased by 4 times to 103 crore, while 5G service covered 99.9% districts and Aadhaar covers 144 crore, adding seamless delivery of welfare services to over 58 crore beneficiaries from the JAM (Aadhaar, Jan Dhan bank account, and Mobile Number) trinity.

The JAM trinity Jan Dhan Accounts, Aadhaar and Mobile connectivity is perhaps the most significant governance infrastructure constructed in independent India. The welfare schemes are reaching the grassroots as direct benefit transfers (DBT) are given directly to citizens worth ₹51 lakh crore where there is no leakage. The spectre of fertiliser subsidy avoidances, leaky PDS and phantasmagorical NREGA workers are now much diminished, if not altogether dispelled.

Infrastructure: Last but not least, the Roads

The national highway network grew from 91,000 km in 2014 to almost 1.5 lakh km in 2026 and the metro railway network covers 1,155 km the third largest in the world. It is not statistical gilding; anyone who has had a say in driving on Indian roads 10 years ago and now, knows the difference is there, and it continues. The rate of railway electrification is unprecedented in the history of the railway, while airport passenger capacity has grown by a considerable amount.

The connectivity projects have changed the landscape of the erstwhile marginalised North-East while making it an integral part of the national growth story. This is as significant as it is geopolitically. An inter-connected North-East is a more secure North-East, a more prosperous one.

The Jobs Problem: The Gap That Won't Close.

This is where the ledger gets uncomfortable and the government has been coy in its candour. The rate of unemployment among the urban youth is 18.4% and, within a year of their graduation, only 7% of the unemployed youth obtain a permanent salaried position. It's not a rounding error, it's a structural failure of a labour market which failed to absorb the demographic dividend that India has. The unemployment rate for Indians aged 15 to 29 years was near about 9.9% and the students protest against leak of question papers and the graduates voicing their discontent over lack of job opportunities, both indicate a gap between aspirations and opportunities.

In the report card “Prachar vs Hisab”, Congress compared the government's commitments with the “reality” for people, for which it blamed the government for failing to create jobs, control inflation and provide economic welfare for the people. The opposition point is discomforting just because it's partly right. India's job creation efforts have not been commensurate with the growth in working age population; this is not occurring in the formal sector. Manufacturing's contribution to GDP has remained adamant about moving towards the 25% target envisioned by “Make in India”. It's just languishing at about 17%.

Structural Reforms: GST and the Long Game

GST was good, but poorly implemented during its fledgling years. A change in the tax structure of a country as large and as complex as India, with its 29 states, hundreds of different product categories and a large informal sector, cannot happen overnight without causing pain. The pain was very real and the government didn't recognise it quickly enough. However, the overall trend is good. GST, which is touted as "One Nation, One Tax," has established a uniform taxation regime while the income tax regime has been simplified with the announcement of a new regime for those with incomes of up to ₹12.75 lakh has come as a relief for the middle class. Today, the ₹1.8 lakh crore monthly collections of GST would have appeared like a dream 10 years ago.

The geopolitical situation is a real change.

In the world, there is a change that is meaningful. Modi's India is no longer a reactive geopolitical actor, it is now a geopolitical shaper. The successful G20 presidency in 2023 was more than visuals. A total of nine major FTA deals with 38 countries have been signed, six of which are in the period from 2024 to 2026 and are now providing greater export opportunities, with the exports reaching a record ₹79 lakh crore in the country. India's stance on the Russia-Ukraine issue, its growing ties with Washington and Moscow as well as its attempt to champion the Global South agenda at multilateral venues, underscore a level of diplomatic assertiveness that the world hadn't seen before.

This is what the Scorecard actually states.

This is an honest read of 12 years: India's macro foundations are better. Inflation has been brought within the RBI's band for long periods. The banking system is more sanitary. It is a world class digital infrastructure, no doubt. The infrastructure investment is now being done at a rate and quality that was done only in spurts in the past by previous governments. Twenty-five crore people have actually lifted their heads above the poverty line.

But there are outstanding obligations to the social contract. The youth unemployment, inflation on key products, the situation of small businesses and farmer distress are important topics to be highlighted by critics and opposition parties. India slipped back to 131st, down from 108th place, on the Global Gender Gap Index, which should be a red flag for anyone who is seriously concerned about inclusive growth.

While that's a reasonable characterization by the Confederation of Indian Industry, there was indeed plenty of economic, social, and infrastructure progress made in India, and the reforms and efficient governance bolstered the country's global profile and resilience. Progress" and "enough" are not the same word, however, and to make such a comparison is doing a disservice to the millions of people who are still waiting for the growth story to reach their dinner table.

India 2026 is indeed a different country from India 2014. Whether it's sufficiently different, and whether the costs of the transition were fairly distributed, is a question honest citizens and honest governments should continue asking, no matter what anniversary it is.