GDP growth to cross 8% next year: Govt https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, June 11

The Government on Thursday said it agreed with the assessment by two international rating agencies of India's GDP growth rate easily crossing 8 per cent next year.

The forecast by the two agencies ndash; Standard's and Poor and Fitch ndash; that India can clock economic growth of 8.5 to 9.5 per cent is heavily predicated on the government carrying out the structural reforms announced during the unveiling of the Rs 20 lakh crore Covid stimulus package.

"That is the path we are quite likely to go in the future," Government's Chief Economic Adviser Krishnamurthy Subramanian told mediapersons through video-conference.

While there will be a contraction this fiscal, there will be a jump next year but the official was unwilling to predict whether the GDP growth will touch near zero during 2020-21 or enter into a negative territory.

At the same time, he acknowledged that the expectations of the rating agencies are heavily based on the government carrying out the radical changes it has promised in an array of sectors from agriculture to public sector enterprise.

He, however, declined to give any estimates for economic growth during the current financial year on grounds that many chips are yet to fall in place. In case the recovery begins in the second half of this year, India may escape with a bottom of the barrel growth rate, he suggested.

from The Tribune https://ift.tt/2zt0Uks