A worker loads LPG cylinders onto a truck in New Delhi, India.

Photograph: Amarjeet Kumar Singh/SOPA Images/ZUMA Press/eyevine

Apr 30th 2026|Mumbai|4 min read

THE LATEST update to the IMF’s global economic statistics in April made grim reading for patriotic Indians. The fund estimated that Britain, home to 70m people, had overtaken its 1.45bn-strong former colony to regain the title of the world’s fifth-largest economy. India dropped to sixth place. The reordering is largely the fault of the rupee. India’s currency lost around a tenth of its value against the dollar in the fiscal year to the end of March.

Signage for Mizuho Bank Ltd., a unit of Mizuho Financial Group Inc. (MHFG), at one of the bank's branches in Tokyo, Japan.

India’s weak currency reflects deeper problems than the Iran war