India, Oct. 25 -- Unless Indians realise the challenges they face, the decade to come can make or break India.

I have a simple proposition in this essay. India's toughest decade since the one that preceded its independence from colonial rule in 1947 is upon us. There is a very simple way of understand this. If this decade goes well, India will hit approximately $10 trillion (US dollars) in GDP and increase per capita income to $5-6,000. It will do this while expanding one of the largest militaries in the world with both nuclear weapons (a fully functional and growing triad), ability to conduct space warfare (anti-satellite capability) and with elite weaponry like supersonic and hypersonic missiles. Once this point is reached, India will ...