India's Gujarat state in western India may have only 5% of the country's population, but it has big ambitions for growth, aiming to become a leading center of industry, finance and economic activity over the next decade. Gujarat, which envisions billions in building and infrastructure projects under way by 2020, moved to propel the effort recently by becoming the first state in India to enact a legal framework for public-private partnerships.
The moves prompted a Washington Post columnist's recent reference to Gujarat as the “China of India,” but the state's mammoth undertaking is not without challenge and setbacks.