Advance alert

Budget must focus on recovering lost ground

The first advance estimates of gross domestic product (GDP), released by the National Statistical Office (NSO), showed the Indian economy would expand by 9.2 per cent in the current fiscal year. Although the headline number looks impressive, it must be noted that the economy contracted by 7.3 per cent last year, and would barely cross the absolute level seen in 2019-20 in real terms. Real growth over FY20 would be just about 1.3 per cent if the given numbers hold. The NSO itself has rightly noted that these are early projections and may undergo revisions because of a variety of