India to grow at less than 7 pc: PM

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said India’s economic growth in 2008-09 is estimated to have fallen below 7 per cent and is likely to remain at that level in the current financial year as well.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said India’s economic growth in 2008-09 is estimated to have fallen below 7 per cent and is likely to remain at that level in the current financial year as well.

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“Our growth rate, which was close to 9 per cent over the previous five years, will fall below 7 per cent in 2008-09...We hope to be able to achieve a similar growth rate in 2009-10, with continuous reliance on monetary and fiscal policy,” the Prime Minister said in his remarks at the dinner hosted by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown for leaders of the G-20 summit here on Wednesday night.

Noting that stimulus measures announced by his government have increased public debt beyond estimated levels in 2008-09, Singh said: “It is our firm intention to return to a fiscally sustainable path after 2010.”

In its advance estimates of national income in February, the Central Statistical Organisation had projected a 7.1 per cent GDP growth rate for 2008-09.

Although Singh has expressed optimism that the economic growth rate of 2008-09 will be maintained this year, many leading multilateral agencies including the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) have forecast a moderation in growth.