India’s rise in recent years is a most prominent development in the world economy. India has re-emerged as one of the fastest growing economies in the world. India’s growth, particularly in manufacturing and services, has boosted the sentiments, both within country and abroad. With an upsurge in investment and robust macroeconomic fundamentals, the future outlook for India is distinctly upbeat. According to many commentators, India could unleash its full potentials, provided it improves the infrastructure facilities, which are at present not sufficient to meet the growing demand of the economy. Failing to improve the country’s infrastructure will slow down India’s growth process. Therefore, Indian government’s first priority is rising to the challenge of maintaining and managing high growth through investment in infrastructure sector, among others.1

The provision of quality and efficient infrastructure services is essential to realize the full potential of the growth impulses surging through the economy. India, while stepping up public investment in infrastructure, has been actively engaged in involving private sector to meet the growing demand. The demand for infrastructure investment during the 11th Five Year Plan (2007-2011) has been estimated to be US$ 492.5 billion (Planning Commission, 2007). To meet this growing demand, Government of India has planned to raise the investment in infrastructure from the present 4.7 percent of GDP to around 7.5 to 8 percent of GDP in the 11th Five Year Plan. In general, efforts towards infrastructure development is continued to focus on the key areas of physical and social infrastructure.

"The expected level of infrastructure investment predicted in the 11th Plan is 2.36 times that of the 10th Plan. Furthermore, this is expected to almost double for the 12th Five Year Plan,"

A report, pointed out that about 97 million jobs are likely to be created over the next 10 years across different sectors in the country.

In 2020, the workforce participation rate will increase to 42 per cent with 585 million working population, implying net increase of 97 million people," it added.

s per estimates, only 27,000 civil engineers are added every year against an annual demand of 4.27 million for the next decade. India's total strength of civil engineers is about 5,33,000.

A sustained period of shortfall in annual supply, coupled with an increasing year-on-year demand, could result in a cumulative demand of nearly 40.2 million civil engineers over 2010-20, with a shortfall of 39.4 million civil engineers over the same period," the report highlighted.