India GDP Growth Remains Solid At 7.6% In September Qtr

(RTTNews) - The Indian economy continued to grow at a robust pace in the three months to September, preliminary data from the statistics ministry showed Thursday.

Gross domestic product grew 7.6 percent year-on-year following a 7.8 percent increase in the June quarter. Economists had forecast 6.8 percent expansion.

In the same quarter a year ago, the economic growth rate was 6.2 percent.

Production side breakdown showed that the latest economic growth was underpinned by stronger performance by the manufacturing, construction, mining and quarrying and utilities sectors.

The gross value added growth in manufacturing surged to 13.9 percent in the September quarter from 4.7 percent in the previous three months.

Likewise, construction output grew 13.3 percent after a 7.9 percent expansion in the previous quarter.

Both the mining and quarrying and utilities sectors logged nearly 10.0 percent growth, which was much stronger than the previous quarter's performance.

Output growth in the farm sector and in the group comprising of hospitality, trade, transport and communication and broadcasting slowed significantly.

Growth in the financial, real estate & professional services grow halved.

GDP growth in the April to September period was 7.7 percent versus 9.5 percent in the same period last year.

Earlier this week, S&P Global Ratings upgraded India's growth projection for the current financial year on domestic momentum but lowered its outlook for the next financial year citing subdued global growth and base effect.

The rating agency forecast the economy to grow 6.4 percent in the year ending March 2024, which was stronger than the previous projection of 6.0 percent. However, this was slightly below the Reserve Bank of India's forecast of 6.5 percent.

The growth outlook for the fiscal year ending March 2025 was lowered to 6.4 percent from 6.9 percent. The downgrade reflects weak global growth, high base of comparison as well as the lagged impact of interest rate hikes, S&P said.

In October, the International Monetary Fund raised India's growth projection to 6.3 percent for this year, while the outlook for next year was retained at 6.3 percent. The lender attributed the 0.2 percentage point upward revision for this year to the stronger-than-expected consumption during April-June.