India as of now represents nearly 17% population of world and one out of every six people is an Indian, living in a country with 7th largest area.
India is moreover third largest contributor to United Nation's peacekeeping missions.
For military, India possesses fifth largest Navy (in terms of total displacement), fourth largest Air Force and Third largest army in the world. India has world's sixth largest defense budget.
India became the first country to do a nuclear test in 1974 after signing of CTBT in 1967 which restricted any country from possessing nuclear weapons except permanent members of UNSC. So, India actually thrashed a useless law to create monopoly of few countries.
A group NSG was formed for nuclear trade to deprive India but the same country got the waivers for nuclear trade in 2008 from NSG and then, got support of all members (except one) to get the membership of the same group.:biggrin2:
Just after P5, India became sixth country to make ballistic missile nuclear submarines, fifth nation to build a 40,000 tonnes aircraft carrier, sixth nation to possess an ICBM.
Moreover, India has further plans to build 9 more nuclear subs(3 more Arihant and 6 follow on), a supercarrier possibly nuclear carrier, a 10000km range ICBM(Agni 6), hypersonic vehicles(HSTDV and BrahMos 2), fifth generation fighters.
India is also going to induct laser weapons systems in next 10 years.
In 1998, India attempted to explode a thermonuclear device. Though only partial success, India has got way more expertise in nuclear tech through civilian sector.
India is still beefing up it's military capabilities fast.
India's defense exports have been doubled from $150 millions to $330 millions last year and is targeted for $2 billions by 2017.
If succeeded, India will not only be one of the largest exporters of weapons, but will itself be fulfilling it's 70% military requirements from homegrown sources in 4-5 years.
Economically, India is world's 7th largest economy in Nominal and 3rd largest economy in terms PPP GDP.
With a growth rate of 7.9% in last quarter, India retained it's tag of fastest growing large in the world and is likely to become 3rd largest economy in terms of Nominal GDP before 2030. Given a large economy, it will undoubtedly have a larger defense budget.