> The Indian middle class is almost equal to the population of
> the entire United States
I would put the Indian middle class at 125-150 million. It's approaching the population of Brazil. Indian government recently released results of a census of Indian households carried out in 2000:
60 mln households (300 mln people roughly) out of a total of 195 mln households have TV sets, 67 mln households have radio sets or transistor radios. But all of them don't belong to the middle class.
I would say that a rough indication of the size of the middle class is provided by the ownership of two wheelers (motorbikes, scooters and mopeds) and cars.That number is 25 mln households (20 mln for two wheelers and 5 mln for cars, muvs etc.) or 125 mln people.
Btw, 43% of the households (80 mln households) have bicycles.
Ulhas