India’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate has declined to 6.1 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2016-17 from seven per cent in the previous quarter, reflecting the impact of demonetisation on key sectors.
With this, India’s economic growth has slowed for the fourth consecutive quarter in the three months ended March, showing the impact of demonetisation on key sectors including construction and financial services.
This slowdown might also put pressure on the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), whose monetary policy committee has lined up a meeting next week, to discuss issues pertaining to economic growth.
Real gross value added (GVA), another measure of economic activity that is arrived at by excluding net indirect taxes from GDP, has reported a decline of 5.6 per cent in the March quarter. This is the fourth consecutive quarterly decline.
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) maintained its previous full-year growth estimate for 2016-17 at 7.1 per cent on top of revised eight per cent growth in the previous financial year.
