This story is so misleading that it's sad. I grew-up in the socialist India. It was called "the Raj." India was a social democracy from its birth in 1947 to 1991. It was on a verge of collapse as someone mentioned below, and IMF gave it a loan of $300M on a condition that it adopts capitalistic policies. Since then India has grown at a much better rate...

Also, let me tell you about what state of Indian in 1994 when immigrated here as a kid:

- We had three models of the cars - Fiat and Ambassador. These two had not changed its model for 30+ years. The new Maruti Suzuki was the third model introduced thru join-venture. Maruti was the first model with power steering. None of the available cars were automatic...most cars in India today are still not automatic as lot of those innovation never made it to India during the socialist Raj. In USA back then, there were at least 100s of models with far advanced technologies.

We had 2 Tv Channels - DoorDarshan (government owned TV) and ZeeTV - which was introduced post 1991 when Government finally opened up allowed private TV channels.

We had one government-owned airlines: Air India - that's it. It is still owned by Indian Government - they were recently trying to sell it but no one purchased it as its so badly run. It also doesn't innovate because it doesn't need profit to survive - government will keep funding it. Indian airports were dumps compared to today where they are finally international standards. Indian train system still doesn't allow private railroads, and yes, there's a reason why bullet trains never made it there.

In order to get a traditional "wired" phone line, we had to wait for years. You filled out a form to get a phone line and years later they would call you and say... hey, you finally have it. Cell phone leap-frogged wired phone lines in India due to capitalism - basic communication wouldn't be there if it was still socialist Raj.

You almost could not start a business in India as an entrepreneur to the scale that companies like PayTM, OYO, Ola Cab, Flipkart thrived. There were just too many laws that essentially disallowed any kind of competition to existing industries.

--------------- Protectionism == no innovation. ---------------

As Winston Churchill said:

"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."

Neither systems are perfect. It's really akin to picking your own poison.

For me, personally, after growing up in socialist India, I love America, the freedom, opportunities, an opportunities it provides.

And, here's the zinger... Thumbs-up would have thrived on its own had they just competed. It has the same taste advantage that Coca-Cola has in US market. Indians had been drinking Thumbs-up for years. It tastes different, and we liked it. We were used to it - after the novelty factor of Coca Cola, people just went back to Thumbs-up. It still thrives...