Figures are deceptive. Few months ago it was a bleak story about the health of the economy with slow down growth and production coming to a sluggish growth. Suddenly the economy leaped to a growth of 7.2 per cent in October-December showing a complete recovery from the twin misadventures – demonetisation and hasty implementation of GST. The downside of the story is euphoria is not going to last as consumption has slowed down resulting in piling up of production backlog. The economy has a long journey before it could actually celebrate the upturn. Despite the long-jump in growth surprising China in one quarter, India is still far behind China in absolute terms. The revival is mostly induced by the government expenditure, which is reflected in soaring fiscal deficit, which has jumped about 114 per cent of the revised full-year estimate of Rs 5.94 lakh crore. Therefore, the onward journey is full of challenges. Plagued by big bank scams like Rs 11,400 crore-PNB, the growth saga can hit some stumbling blocks. With Parliament elections due in 2019 government may go for structural reforms which will further aid higher growth in the industrial and services sector as well as spending by the Centre. The last time India had a faster growth rate was in the final three months of 2016. The Ministry of Statistics also revised its 2017-18 GDP growth forecast to 6.6 per cent from 6.5 per cent earlier and revised upward its GDP growth for the July-Sept quarter, to 6.5 per cent, from an earlier estimate of 6.3 per cent. The most concerning sector is generation of jobs if statistics are to be believed India has only created jobs equivalent to 0.9 percent of the adult population between 2005 and 2012 and most of these regular wage jobs created went to men. Also, in Bangladesh 33 per cent of its labours force working in industry is women whereas in India it’s only about 17 per cent. This reflects the importance of job creation in general and women specific for the overall growth of the economy.
