India is expected to retain the position for the fastest-growing major economy in January-March quarter, overtaking China’s 6.8 percent. The growth in India is driven by gains in manufacturing and increased consumer spending, according to a Reuters poll, which is based on this quarters annual growth was 7.3 percent.
The number is by the far the best pace that Indian economy has seen since July-September quarter in 2016 when Demonetization was introduced by the incumbent government. The forecast for the coming January – March quarter ranged from 6.9 to 7.7 percent.
The Indian government’s GDP data is set to be released on Thursday. India’s economic affairs secretary, Subhash Chandra Garg said growth in the country is expected to be in between 7.3 – 7.5 percent.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in order to boost the country’s economic growth, had introduced a nationwide goods and services tax and paved way for direct foreign investment in defence and e-commerce businesses, among others.
The fiscal year 2017-2018 saw a capital investment growth of 9 percent in the last quarter in comparison it was just around 2.4 percent the year earlier, which shows that the private investments have picked up. The consumption, on the other hand, remains strong in the $2.5 trillion Economy. Consumption accounts for around 70% of the Indian economy.
This is not the first time an International forum has lauded India and the growth trajectory under Prime Minister Modi’s leadership. Recently, Moody’s had backed Modi and upgraded India’s sovereign rating for the first time in 14 years. The World Bank had also projected a solid growth trajectory under Modi’s reign. India has also jumped 30 places in Ease of Doing Business ranking and the opposition was surprisingly not happy about it. Recently, Michael Dell had spoken of how he was inspired by India and Bill Gates had lauded Modi’s Aadhaar scheme and said that he has funded the World Bank to take the Aadhaar approach to other countries. We had earlier reported how IMF (International Monetary Fund) expects India’s economic growth to reach 7.4 percent in the fiscal year of 2018-19.
