For decades, India’s economic promise has rested on its demographic dividend – the competitive edge of a massive, young, and increasingly educated workforce. Economists and policymakers have routinely cited the country’s population profile as its ticket to economic superpower status, with projections of reaching $10 trillion in GDP and achieving high-income status by 2047.These forecasts depend heavily on a critical assumption: that roughly 500 million Indians currently aged 5-24 will find produ...