In a move, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman tabled the Economic Survey 2025 before the Parliament on Friday, January 31, forecasts the project India’s GDP growth in 2025 to range between 6.3 percent to 6.8 percent during the year 2025-26. The survey is released even as global uncertainties loom, following closely on this survey by the Economic Survey for 2022-23 presented in July 2024. In the first advance estimates of Economic Survey 2024-25, for the financial year 2024-25, India’s real GDP growth is estimated to be at 6.4%, with the growth rate almost at its decadal average growth.
The survey also indicated that all the principal sectors of the economy are performing well, a unique indication of a way forward for the economy. Agriculture continues to do extremely well, outperforming its trend levels. Rebounding, the industrial sector is outperforming pre-pandemic performance, and services, which have continued to grow more quickly than most other sectors in recent years, are almost back to their long trend.
And inflation management, too, seems to be on the right track. In the April – December 2024 period, headline retail inflation has eased to 4.9 percent as compared to 5.4 percent in the last financial year. This is a positive development for the Indian economy because, according to the survey, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) expect India’s consumer price inflation to gradually align with around 4 percent by FY26.
A mixed trend of Foreign Portfolio Investments (FPIs) has been observed because of uncertainty in global markets and also due to profit taking, the Economic Survey added. However, the country has managed to keep FPI flows positive despite the macroeconomic fundamentals and its strong business environment. In addition, FDI inflows have rebounded in 2024 – 2025, but net FDI inflows are negative as compared to 2023 due to increased repatriation and disinvestment activities.
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