but S&P lowers it to 5.5%

Standard and Poor’s has lowered the growth forecast for India to 5.5 per cent for this fiscal, from 6.5 per cent projected earlier, citing ‘volatile’ global economic situation. According to S&P, Asia-Pacific is feeling the pressure of ongoing global economic uncertainty and it has lowered India growth forecast by one percentage point to 5.5 per cent for this fiscal from 6.5 per cent earlier. Lack of monsoon rains has affected India, ‘for which agriculture still forms a substantial part of the economy’, the report said. Moreover, ‘global investors have become more critical of India’s policy and infrastructure shortcomings which was recently highlighted by the power outage in early August that affected 20 of India’s 28 states,’ the report added.

The report, however, did not mention anything about the recent reforms push by the Indian government.

Last week, the government effected a steep 12 per cent hike in diesel prices and capped subsidised cooking gas to consumers. Besides, it allowed FDI in multi-brand retail, aviation, broadcasting and power exchanges.