Is GDP overestimated or underestimated? Congress’ Jairam Ramesh highlights article by Central Statistical Office ex-DGs

New Delhi [India], April 19 (ANI): Congress leader Jairam Ramesh on Wednesday highlighted an article written by Davendra Varma, former director general, Central Statistical Office (CSO), and Ashish Kumar, former director general of ministry of statistics and programme implementation on the chief economic advisors — Krishnamurthy Subramanian and Arvind Subramanian, who was the predecessor. The article dwells on the reason why India needs to fill the gross domestic production (GDP) data gap at the earliest.

According to Jairam Ramesh’s tweet, “A Tale of 2 CEA Subramanians! One says GDP growth rate is underestimated while other feels it is overestimated. This piece by professionals who have managed the Govt statistical system takes both of them on-more the former. Its plea to preserve integrity of that system is timely.”
In the article, the authors wrote, “Interestingly, his predecessor as CEA, Arvind Subramanian, had argued that the growth rate in the manufacturing sector in India is overestimated by about 2 per cent in the 2011-12 series in his 2019 Harvard University paper. Krishnamurthy Subramanian, on the other hand, now claims that the growth rate in GDP/gross value added (GVA) and its components are underestimated due to non-revision of base.”

They said, “The fact is that both are incorrect. It is correct that base year revision will result in capturing a lot of new activities in recent years, and shall have an impact on the estimates of GDP/GVA. However, it is difficult to predict whether it will result in a revision of growth rates upwards or downwards.”