What makes the situation in India peculiar is not just the lack of 3G, but the variance within the band. It is not unusual to see "3G" connection with 15Kbs speeds.
A recent study, which I am unable to dig into at this moment, showed that the aggregate bandwidth of a 3G connection in India is only marginally (~18%) faster than a 2G connection.
The second challenge we encounter is "fake" connectivity - even though the phone shows 3G or 2G, it is not a guarantee that there exists a data network at all.
And yet another study found that more than half of the country did not get what upgrading to 3G meant. If and when the phone companies successfully win the mind share of this half and encourage them to switch over to 3G, the situation will deteriorate even further because of the load on the band.
A dated but an effective coverage of the situation - http://www.economist.com/node/10214756
Creating adaptive (and even offline apps, especially regulated financial industry apps) is super-challenging from a product point.
I will be glad to answer any other questions, related to this topic.
P.S - I have spent ~15 years in NYC and a few years in London and can empathize with the comments in this thread. But building mobile apps for India, takes a different thinking IMHO. We need to wear the hat of a microkernel / embedded systems developer from 8085 era.
Shameless Plug - we are hiring programmers / mathematicians to solve problems like this. If interested, please email me. ID in my profile.