[chakde]

Well comparing GINI across similar sized countries: India (36.8), Russia (39.9), US (40.8), China (46.9), Brazil (49.3), India is the lowest of the group.

While its true that most european countries have slightly lower GINI, they also have a higher 10% ratio (highest to lowest) than India.

So it's pretty hard to argue from the actual statistics that inequality is the outstanding problem of India as it is often made out to be.

But it's perhaps true that the contrast is more visible in India than elsewhere - with slums next to high rises.

I think the reason for this is that growth is relatively narrowly focussed around a few metros, which then attracts a big influx of job seeking rural population. The other big countries never had such a big rural population to begin with.