‘Fabbing’ India into a superpower

A high-tech command centre for Dholera Smart City, which is in the early stages of development, in Dholera. — ©2023 The New York Times Company

IN his office in New Delhi, Ashwini Vaishnaw, the Indian minister of electronics and information technology, keeps a 30cm disc of silicon semiconductor on the wall, gleaming like a platinum record beside a portrait of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Its circuits, measured in nanometers and invisible to the human eye, may be the most sophisticated objects ever made. It vies with oil as one of the most valuable traded goods on earth.