in driving economic growth and development. Nehru also believed that protecting domestic industries would help to promote industrialization and economic development in India, and he implemented a number of protectionist policies during his time in office. He saw such government intervention as a way to modernize the Indian economy which had been left impoverished by decades of colonial rule. However, Nehru did not seek to eliminate the private sector entirely, as was the case in the Soviet Union. Rather, he pursued a policy of creating a mixed economy in India, with strategic industries under state control and public sector corporations guiding investment, while also allowing for a significant role for the private sector and market forces.. The economic centralization and controls required for the war effort during World War II helped create the bureaucratic and manufacturing infrastructure necessary to institute Nehru's plans, and so following independence and his election as prime minister, he had the opportunity to put his ideas into action. In his speech to the Constituent Assembly of India, he declared, "The service of India means the service of the millions who suffer. It means the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity." By the late 1950s, the Swatantra Party, the country's first market-friendly political party, had formed in opposition to Nehru's policies. This party, which was made up of ex-landlords, businessmen, and rich peasants, argued that Nehru's centralized economic policies were incompatible with democracy. In a memorandum to party officials, they claimed that "the best guarantee of speed in progress is a maximum of individual freedom and a minimum of governmental interference." They argued that Nehru's policies were stifling individual initiative and freedom and slowing economic progress. Chakravarti Rajagopalachari, a founder of the Swatantra Party, coined the term “Permit-License Raj” to encapsulate the party's frustrations with Nehru's policies, writing in his right-wing magazine Swarajya: Characteristics A key characteristic of the Licence Raj was a Planning Commission that centrally administered the economy of the country. Like a command economy, India had Five-Year Plans on the lines of the five-year plans in the Soviet Union. However, unlike Soviet Union, private sector also played a significant role. The Planning Commission was set up in 1950 to survey the available resources in the country and formulate plans to raise the standard of living. Planning Commission enacted the First Five Year Plan in 1951, aimed at developing the