The country's fiscal deficit soared to a seven-year high of 4.6 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2019-20 mainly on account of poor revenue realisation.
India's fiscal deficit touched 128.5 per cent of the whole year budget target at January-end, said the Controller General of Accounts (CGA) on Friday. The deficit during the same period during 2018-19 was 121.5 per cent of that year's Revised Budget Estimate (RE).
Throwing his weight behind Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's budget numbers, Reserve Bank Governor Shaktikanta Das has said that there is no reason to doubt that the government will be able to cut fiscal deficit to 3.5 per cent of the GDP in the fiscal beginning April 1.
Payment of adjusted gross revenue dues of Rs 1.20 lakh crore by telcos will reduce the fiscal deficit for 2019-20 to 3.5 per cent of the GDP from the revised estimate of 3.8 per cent of the GDP, economists at SBI said on Monday. However, one will have to wait till March 16 - the payment deadline - before the picture gets clear, they said.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman interacted with industry representatives in February 07 in Mumbai.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi replied in Lok Sabha to the Motion of Thanks on the President's Address, on February 06.
While presenting Union Budget 2020-21 in Parliament, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that the fiscal deficit for year 2019-20 was 3.8. She said,"We estimate a fiscal deficit of 3.8% in RE 2019-20 and 3.5% for BE 2020-21."
Fiscal deficit is pegged at 3.8 percent in current fiscal and 3.5 percent in the next, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said as she presented Budget 2020 in Parliament.
Ahead of Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's second Budget, Chief Economic Adviser K V Subramanian on Friday suggested the government should focus on growth rather than being rigid on fiscal deficit in times of the slowing economy.
In an exclusive conversation with India TV Digital, Former Finance Secretary CM Vasudev delved upon the upcoming Budget amid India's current fragile economic conditions.
“The government must stop disinvestment, strategic sale, corporatisation and privatisation of public sector undertakings. The PSUs are the backbone of the Indian industrial structure and government must stop policy-driven privatisation of the same,” the RSS-affiliated union said
Fitch said it was revising the fiscal deficit forecast as revenue collection is likely to fall far short of the projections in the FY2019/20 Union Budget due to weak goods and services tax (GST) and corporate income tax collections.
India's fiscal deficit reached nearly 93 per cent of the budget estimate at Rs 6.52 lakh crore at the end of September in the current financial year, government data showed on Thursday.
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