Centre clarifies after ex-Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian says growth was 'overestimated'
New Delhi, June 12 (IBNS): As former Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian suggested that India's growth figures are overestimated, the Centre on Tuesday clarified that the country's economic growth are based on "accepted procedures, methodologies and available data".
"With any Base Revision, as new and more regular data sources become available, it is important to note that a comparison of the old and new series are not amenable to simplistic macro-econometric modelling," the government said in a statement.
"It may also be seen that the GDP growth projections brought out by various national and international agencies are broadly in line with the estimates released by MOSPI," it said.
"The GDP estimates released by the Ministry are based on accepted procedures, methodologies and available data and objectively measure the contribution of various sectors in the economy," read the statement.
The statement said that the Ministry of Statistics and Program Implementation has released details from time to time to explain the complexities involved in GDP compilation.
"The estimation of GDP in any economy is a complex exercise where several measures and metrics are evolved to better measure the performance of the economy," it said.
"For the purpose of global standardization and comparability, countries follow the System of National Accounts evolved in the UN after elaborate consultation. The System of National Accounts 2008 (2008 SNA) is the latest version of the international statistical standard for the national accounts, adopted by the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) in 2009 and is an update of the earlier 1993 SNA. The Inter-Secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA) was mandated to develop the 2008 SNA through intense discussions and consultation with member countries. India also participated in the deliberations of the Advisory Expert Group," read the statement.
"In its adoption of the 2008 SNA the UNSC encouraged Member States, regional and sub-regional organizations to implement its recommendations and use it for the national and international reporting of national accounts statistics based on the available data sources," it said.
As per an article published in The Indian Express, the former Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramani said the actual growth figures were closer to 4.5 per cent and not 7 per cent between 2011 and 2017.
This period included both the UPA2 and the NDA1 governments regimes.
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