Economic Survey pegs growth at 6.3% to 6.8%

India's Economic Survey 2024-25 predicts 6.3-6.8% growth, emphasizing need for strategic policy management and domestic growth drivers.

India’s economy is expected to grow in the range of 6.3% and 6.8% in 2025-26, the Economic Survey for 2024-25, tabled in Parliament on Friday (January 31, 2025) reckoned, arguing that the fundamentals of the domestic economy remain robust, with a strong external account, calibrated fiscal consolidation and stable private consumption.

While there are upsides to domestic investment, output growth and disinflation in the coming year, these are peppered with equally strong, prominently extraneous, downsides, the Survey’s authors stated, referring to significant global political and economic uncertainties as a key risk.

“Navigating global headwinds will require strategic and prudent policy management and reinforcing the domestic fundamentals,” the Survey asserted, with Chief Economic Adviser V. Anantha Nageswaran emphasising that globalisation is in retreat and the era of rapid world trade growth clouds the outlook for India’s export growth so domestic growth drivers will be more critical in coming years.

“... Historically, India’s export growth has been a high beta play on global export growth. This means domestic growth levers will be relatively more important than external ones in the coming years,” he averred in his preface to the Survey.

Raising India’s growth average in the next two decades will require reaping the demographic dividend through a deregulation stimulus, Mr. Nageswaran said, pointing to the Spartans’ apparent belief “the more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war”.

“This Economic Survey is all about that, or so we would like to believe,” he said in the preface, cautioning that ‘Business as usual’ carries a high risk of economic growth stagnation, if not economic stagnation for the country.

Referring to the impact of China’s emergence as a manufacturing colossus on global firms’ competitiveness, the CEA said this is ‘no less’ a challenge for India too.