World Bank Executive Director Neelkanth Mishra has termed “ill-educated” and “egregiously wrong” the claims that India’s economy grew by 2.6 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal as against the 7.8 per cent.
Garg claimed that the current prices GDP last year was ₹ 86 lakh crore, which was revised down to ₹ 80 lakh crore, and that had that not been done, the GDP growth would have been only 2.6 per cent.
“That claim is so obviously wrong that several logical rebuttals have already been made. “As expected, with the fiscal headwinds fading and monetary headwinds (falling credit growth till 1HFY26) becoming tailwinds (credit growth accelerating), GDP growth is surprising on the upside, and should help push up consensus trend-growth estimates to 7 per cent-plus. That is, with a neutral fiscal and monetary policy, the economy should still register 7.5 per cent growth,” Mishra said. He said personal vehicle (cars, SUVs) dispatches grew 35 per cent YoY in August despite just 9 per cent growth in exports.
But bad information tends to travel further than good information, and so it is important to reiterate and reinforce the argument,” said Mishra, who till recently was the Chief Economist of Axis Bank. “Hopefully, now there will be fewer people asking ‘why private sector investment is weak’, given that there is clear evidence of investments,” he said.
