India's external debt edged up by 1.7 per cent during the first six months of the ongoing fiscal to $483.2 billion at the September-end, the government said on Thursday. Finance Ministry in a release said the rise in external debt during the period was due to long-term external debt particularly commercial borrowings and NRI deposits.
However, on a sequential basis, total external debt at September-end declined by $291 million from the June end. "At end-September 2015, India's external debt stock stood at $483.2 billion, recording an increase of $8.0 billion over the level at end-March 2015," the ministry said. The external debt consist of long-term debt of $397.1 billion (up 1.9 per cent from March) and short-term debt $86.1 billion (increase of 0.7 per cent). Share of commercial borrowings was highest at 37.7 per cent of total external debt, followed by NRI deposits at 25.2 per cent and multilateral debt at 11 per cent. "At end-September 2015, long-term external debt accounted for 82.2 per cent of India's total external debt, while the remaining (17.8 per cent) was short-term external debt," the statement said. Sovereign external debt stood at $88.9 billion in September 2015 while non-government debt amounted to $394.3 billion, it added.
The statement noted that the share of dollar denominated debt continued to be the highest in external debt stock at 57.7 per cent at end-September 2015.