Yes, corrosion; rust; is quietly eating away 4.3% of India’s GDP. That’s ₹15 lakh crore annually. Globally, countries lose about 3.4%. We’re worse. And the worst-hit? Power, telecom, railways, and roads. Power sector loses 10.1% of its GDP to rust. Telecom towers? Millions of them, and many aren’t even fully protected. Railways lose ₹25,000 crore yearly; not from delays or tickets, but from corroded tracks and bridges. Here’s the twist: we can stop it. With better materials, smarter maintenance, and thinking beyond ‘cheaper now’ to ‘longer-lasting’. The report says fixing this could add ₹5 lakh crore to our GDP yearly. Big projects, smart policies, and steel infrastructure? They’re all vulnerable. And if we don’t fix rust now, we’ll pay double later; first in repairs, then in lost growth. Rust isn’t just an engineering problem. It’s an economic time bomb. And it’s ticking.