GDP growth in Q2 good; uncertainty remains for 2nd half: Arvind Subramanian

GDP growth numbers for the first half of the current financial year have revealed a good and consistent performance but lot of uncertainty remains on the outlook for the second half, Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian said on Wednesday.

The Indian economy, according to government data released on Wednesday, recorded 7.3% growth for the July-September quarter of 2016-17, up from 7.1% in the first quarter.

According to various estimates however the GDP growth this financial year is expected to witness a decline due to demonetisation of 500 and 1000 rupee notes, but the range varies from 0.5-2%.

"What we have for first half are actual numbers. It shows good consistent performance. For second half we will have to see, there is a lot of uncertainty. We have to analyse it before we say something," Subramanian said.

"There is good news in the sense that real GDP growth has picked up, so there is a kind of steady improvement. There is some indication of some improvement in underlying strength in the economy which is reflected in the fact that nominal GDP growth has accelerated," he said.

In terms of the challenging aspect of the data, investment is down substantially and that is something that needs to be watched, he said, adding that there is some increase in GDP on the strength of government consumption and expenditure.

On the impact of demonetisation in the third quarter, Subramanian said it will be subject to a considerable amount of uncertainty.

"We are in the process of analysing all the data and we will do the analysis in good time. Uncertainty is on the monetary impact, short term and long term benefits. Since we are in uncharted water, we need to get a lot of data and need to put in a lot of analysis before we can come up something meaningfully worthwhile to reflect on," he said.