Covid-19 lockdown wipes out service activity in April, PMI drops to 5.4

As many as 97 per cent of the 500 companies surveyed by IHS Markit, which conducts the survey, reported a fall in output

The month-long lockdown of the country in April to check the spread of coronavirus led to services activity in India contracting at the fastest pace in over 14 years to unprecedented low levels, according to a monthly survey released on Wednesday.

The IHS Markit Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) saw an extreme decline in April, to just 5.4. This was significantly lower than March's 49.3. In PMI parlance, the 50-mark threshold separates expansion from contraction. The global coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic had already cut short the good times in India’s services sector, which had seen contraction in March because overseas demand fell and