Indian economy may contract by 25 percent in current fiscal: Economist Arun Kumar

The Indian economy is not recovering as fast as the government claims and the country's economy may contract 25 per cent in the current financial year, noted economist Arun Kumar said on Sunday. Kumar further said that due to a big decline in the GDP during the current financial year, the budget estimates have gone completely out of gear and, therefore, there is a need to correct the Budget.

"India's economic growth is not recovering as fast as the government is showing because the unorganised sector has not started recovering and some major components of the services sector have not recovered.

"My analysis shows that the rate of growth will be (-)25 per cent in the current financial year because during lockdown (during April-May), only essential production was taking place and even in agriculture, there was no growth.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has projected the Indian economy to contract 7.5 per cent in the current financial year, while the National Statistical Office (NSO) estimates a contraction of 7.7 per cent.

Also, according to the NSO, the Indian economy contracted by 23.9 per cent during the April-June 2020 quarter and recovered faster than expected in the July-September 2020 quarter as a pick-up in manufacturing helped GDP clock a lower contraction of 7.5 per cent.