India reports GDP growth for January-March quarter at 3.1%; 4.2% for FY20

An economist poll conducted by Reuters had pegged GDP growth at 2.1 per cent in the last quarter of FY 2019-20.

India’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth slowed to 3.1 per cent in January-March quarter, official data showed on Friday. In the corresponding quarter of 2018-19 the GDP growth was recorded at 5.8 per cent.

An economist poll conducted by Reuters had pegged GDP growth at 2.1 per cent in the last quarter of FY 2019-20, with yearly forecasts ranging between +4.5 per cent and -1.5 per cent.

Data released by the statistics department showed GDP growth for FY20 is better than initially expected at 4.2 per cent, but lowest in 11 years, as COVID-19 caused nationwide lockdown affected the manufacturing and service sector. The same was recorded at 6.1 in the previous year.

The government imposed lockdown on March 25 to combat COVID-19. However, slowing down of business activities across the world in January-March impacted the Indian economy.

The Reserve Bank of India had pegged the GDP growth for 2019-20 at 5 per cent as projected by the NSO in its first and second advance estimates released earlier this year in January and February respectively.

China’s economy shrank by 6.8 per cent in January-March 2020 due to the impact of coronavirus infection.