New Delhi: It is official, and it is bad news. Marking the worst economic performance of the Narendra Modi government, the Indian economy grew at five per cent this quarter (April-June, 2019), and is second only to the worst performance recorded under the UPA-2 regime in the quarter of January-March, 2013.
Despite several measures by the government to revive the economy, India’s economic growth plunged to a six-year low of five per cent in last quarter, compared to eight per cent in the same period of last year. The slowdown was driven by weak investment growth, poor demand and weak global trade, according to official data released Friday.
“A sharp deceleration in manufacturing growth and a subdued farm sector activity pulled down the GDP growth to five per cent,” data released by the Union ministry of statistics and programme implementation confirmed. India has already lost its fastest growing economy tag to China in the last quarter, by growing at 5.8 per cent, allowing the dragon to overtake the tiger. This growth figure marks a further widening of the gap between the Indian and Chinese economic growth trajectory.
According to the government data, the growth in the manufacturing sector tumbled to 0.6 per cent from 12.1 per cent recorded in the April-June quarter of last year. The farming sector’s growth decl-ined by more than half, to a mere two per cent from the 5.1 per cent level last year, whereas construction slowed to 5.7 per cent from 9.6 per cent earlier.
The fall of growth by half in sectors like manufacturing, farming and construction, which drive growth, could have an adverse impact on consumption, which the government has been desperately trying to revive.
