Services Output Index Debuts

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India to launch monthly Index of Services Production with a 60-day reporting lag to track real-time services sector growth

Highlights

First-ever Index of Services Production (ISP) to be released on July 14, 2026.
New index will use 2024-25 as the base year.
ISP will track short-term growth trends in the services sector.
Key sectors include banking, telecom, transport, retail, hospitality and real estate.
GST data, administrative records and enterprise surveys will be used for compilation.

New Delhi: India is set to introduce a new macroeconomic indicator aimed at providing a clearer and more frequent picture of the country’s services sector performance. The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) has announced that the first-ever Index of Services Production (ISP), with 2024-25 as the base year, will be released on July 14, 2026, covering data for April 2026.

The new index will be published every month with a 60-day lag, similar to how the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) tracks manufacturing and industrial activity. Subsequent ISP releases will be announced on the 29th day of each month, or the next working day if it falls on a holiday.

The ISP has been designed to serve as a counterpart to the IIP and will help policymakers, economists, businesses and investors assess short-term movements in the services sector, which now contributes more than half of India’s Gross Value Added (GVA).

According to MoSPI, the ISP will cover a broad range of service industries, including wholesale and retail trade, transport, banking, insurance, telecommunications, hotels and restaurants, real estate, professional and technical services, and arts and entertainment activities. The ministry also plans to include healthcare and education services in the future after the availability of data from the Annual Survey of Incorporated Services Sector Enterprises (ASISSE).

The conceptual and methodological framework for the new index was developed with the support of a Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) formed in May 2025. The committee was chaired by Debjani Ghosh of NITI Aayog and included representatives from academia, industry bodies and government departments.

MoSPI said the ISP aims to strengthen India’s statistical framework by providing high-frequency information on the performance of the services economy. The ministry will rely on three major data sources — administrative records, GST returns and ASISSE data — for compiling the index.

Since GST data is being used for statistical applications for the first time and some data sources are still evolving, the government will initially release experimental or trial ISP estimates to test their stability and reliability before transitioning to regular publication.

The ministry also clarified that since services data is generally collected in nominal value terms, a price deflator will be used to remove the impact of inflation. This will allow the ISP to measure actual changes in service output and provide a more accurate assessment of real economic activity in the sector.