World Bank's Neelkanth Mishra Calls GDP Data Row Claims 'Ill-Educated and Egregiously Wrong'
· Business · Hindustan Times, The Hindu, India Today
World Bank Executive Director Neelkanth Mishra has dismissed as 'ill-educated and egregiously wrong' the claims that India's economy grew by only 2.6 per cent in the first quarter of FY27 against the government's 7.8 per cent figure. The rebuttal, posted on X, came after former finance secretary S C Garg argued that a downward revision in the base year GDP from ₹86 lakh crore to ₹80 lakh crore artificially inflated the growth print. Mishra said the downward revision in the base was known since March and that the new data series introduced in February 2026 cleaned up the data and improved methodology. He added that with fiscal headwinds fading and credit growth rebounding, GDP growth is surprising on the upside and consensus trend-growth estimates should move above 7 per cent. Personal vehicle dispatches grew 35 per cent YoY in August, he noted, as evidence that real-economy activity remains robust.
Why it matters
The dispute cuts to how India measures its own economic progress, and Mishra's pushback from a senior multilateral platform lends weight to the official 7.8 per cent figure against critics who accuse the government of data manipulation ahead of its economic narrative.
Read the original report — Hindustan Times
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