There is scholarly consensus that colonialism was a phenomenon that frustrated all possibilities of growth of the Indian economy. Over the fifty years that preceded independence in 1947, food grain output in India grew at a meagre 0.1 per cent per annum (Blyn, 1966). In the period following independence, agricultural growth in India began to pick up. Between 1949-50 and 1964-65, the index of agricultural production (IAP) grew by 3.1 per cent per annum, driven by high growth rates in both food grain and non-food grain production. The growth rate of IAP, however, fell to 2.3 per cent in the period between 1967-68 and 1980-81. There was a recovery in the growth rate of IAP in the period between 1981-82 and 1991-92, with the IAP growing at 3.4 per cent. In the final period between 1992-93 and 2005-06, the growth rate of IAP fell to a meagre 1.2 per cent. Significantly, for the first time after independence, the rate of growth of IAP fell behind the rate of growth of population in the last period. The above periodisation remains valid when we consider the GVO data from CSO also.

KEYWORDS: Indian economy, cropping intensity, irrigation system, food insecurity.