Post Covid-19 Challenges and Economic Development Through Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises in India

At present, the entire world is facing one of the biggest crises, i.e., Covid-19 pandemic. The outbreak of this disease has started from Wuhan city of China and has spread in the entire nations of the world. As the Covid-19 is a transferable disease, which spreads from person to person, in order to prevent it from spreading, lockdown was imposed in almost all the nations of world. However, the lockdown has simultaneously led to shutdown of world economy. Therefore, now, Covid-19 is not only a global health crisis but has also become an economic crisis of the world. Covid-19 has drastically affected the economies of developing and less developed countries of the world, and same is the case with India. Nonetheless, Indian economy was already in a crunch of slow growth rate from last 3 years. However, the shutdown of economic activities due to Covid-19 has further worsened the growth rate of Indian economy. The growth rate of Indian economy had already declined to 4.18% in 2019 from 8.8% in 2016. But with this economic shutdown, the growth rate of Indian economy has gone to −10.58% in 2020. This negative growth rate has seemed to be an alarming situation for India. Therefore, there is a strong need for policy intervention and measures to review the growth process of India economy. In this regard, the development of new business models through micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) can play pivotal role in reconstruction and restructuring the growth and development of India economy. MSMEs are the cornerstone of developed economies. MSME contributes to 52% of GDP in South Africa, 44% in USA, 51% in UK, and 54% in Germany. Therefore, the present chapter explores the role of micro, small, and medium enterprises in promoting and reconstructing the economic development of India during post Covid-19 era.