Beating China, India regains place of fastest-growing economy in the world
New Delhi, March 1: Reversing the slowing GDP growth, India has now beat China which grew by 6.8% in the October-December period. The Central Statistical Office (CSO) has reported a GDP growth of 7.2% in the December quarter (Q3) of 2017-18 for India.
The growth for the second quarter (July-September) has been revised upwards to 6.5 per cent, from 6.3 per cent estimated earlier by the CSO. The previous high was recorded at 7.5 per cent in the July-September quarter of 2016-17.
The CSO said that the real GDP or Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at constant (2011-12) prices in 2017-18 is likely to be Rs 130.04 lakh crore, as against the first revised estimate for 2016-17 of Rs 121.96 lakh crore, released on January 31.
The gross valued added (GVA) for manufacturing in the quarter under review grew at 8.9% higher than 6.9% in the previous quarter. Similarly, the farm sector GVA grew at 4.1% compared to 2.7% in the previous quarter. The construction sector recorded a growth of 6.8%, higher than 2.8% in previous quarter.
Meanwhile, giving thumbs to India’s growth story, eight infrastructure sectors grew a faster pace of 6.7% in January as against 3.4% in the year-ago month as petroleum refinery and cement output zoomed while steel power and coal production improved.
The eight core sectors — coal, crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilisers, steel, cement and electricity — had grew by 4.2% in December and 7.4% in November this financial year. Petroleum refinery production spurted 11% in January against a flat output in the year-ago month. Cement output jumped 20.7% in the month against 13.3% contraction in the year-ago period.
Electricity generation growth also fast paced to 8.2% in January against 5.2% in January 2017.
Coal sector output improved by 3% and steel production by 3.7% in January 2018. Crude oil production however dropped 3.2%, fertilisers by 1.6% and natural gas by 1% in the month under review.
However, the growth in the eight core sectors during April-January this fiscal slowed to 4.3% as against 5.1% in the same period last fiscal. The growth in key sectors will have implications for the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) as these eight segments account for about 41% of the total factory output.
Meanwhile, Global rating agency Moodys has projected India's GDP growth to 7.6% for the current fiscal, recovering from the effects of DeMo and GST. "There are some signs that the Indian economy is starting to recover from the soft growth patch attributed to the negative impact of the demonetisation undertaken in 2016 and disruption related to last year's rollout of the GST)," the financial services firm said.