CEA sees 6.5% GDP growth backed by robust data

At ISB’s Data User’s Conference, India’s Chief Economic Adviser V. Anantha Nageswaran highlighted robust macro numbers—6.5% real and 9.9% nominal GDP growth for FY 2024-25—as the highest among major economies.

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“If numbers tell a story then India stands tall.” With these words, Chief Economic Adviser V. Anantha Nageswaran set the tone for his keynote at the Data User’s Conference held on May 27 at the Indian School of Business (ISB), Hyderabad. Organised in collaboration with the National Statistics Office (NSO) and the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), the event focused on fostering dialogue between data producers and users and spotlighting the importance of high-quality data for policy-making.

Nageswaran highlighted that “right now India’s macroeconomic numbers paint a very promising picture.” Citing the second advanced estimates from the NSO, he noted that real GDP is projected to grow by 6.5% in FY 2024-25, with nominal GDP growth pegged at 9.9%—among the highest globally. He pointed out that growth remains strong across all major sectors, including industries—particularly construction—services, and agriculture. The latter is expected to rebound to 4.6% in 2024-25, up from 2.7% in the previous fiscal year.

The conference focused on the results of the Annual Survey of Unincorporated Sector Enterprises (ASUSE) 2023-24 and a forward-looking survey on private sector CAPEX investment intentions. Nageswaran underlined the value of granular data in driving transformative policy reforms.

Saurabh Garg, IAS, Secretary, MoSPI, spoke about improvements in data dissemination through a newly upgraded portal with API access, interactive visualisations, and global collaborations—efforts aimed at supporting more localised decision-making.

Professor Madan Pillutla, Dean of ISB, expressed hope that the event would be the first of many such collaborations. He stressed that in an era of advanced analytics, “the integrity of data is critical for building robust predictive models and deriving actionable insights,” marking the conference as part of ISB’s 25-year legacy of policy-focused research.