Introduction

India is a land of an enormous number of traditional cultural industries which are juxtaposed with rapidly developing modern knowledge and cultural industries. Collectively, they offer India a possibility of faster economic growth. The present chapter introduces general issues in research on CCI and related policies, and specific opportunities and challenges in the case of India. It highlights the general themes emerging across this volume regarding CCI in India, including relevant reports and sources of data, growth of Indian CCI, clustering patterns, the social embeddedness of CCI, informality, and occasional linkages between traditional and pre-industrial modes of production in some Indian CCI with a wider trend of digitalization.