CEA hits out at ex-CEA for cherry-picking indicators to doubt growth figures

New Delhi, July 4 (IANS) Chief Economic Advisor (CEA) Krishnamurthy Subramanian on Thursday indirectly hit out at fromer CEA Arvind Subramanian for cherry-picking indicators to raise doubts over India's GDP numbers, saying there were many indicators which contradicted the claims of those who criticised data credibility.

"There are other indicators that could be correlated to find out the truth. My observation is that India is an economy with many touch points for policy and that is why it is very hard to try and make a narrative which is different from truth," the CEA said.

Last month, former CEA Arvind Subramanian had said that India's GDP growth was overestimated by 2.5 per cent during 2011-2017, raising a lot of controversy over the credibility of the fugures.

The overestimation occurred after the UPA government changed the methodology in calculating GDP in 2012, said a report authored by Arvind Subramanian.

India has been the world's fastest growing major economy until recently, but the new study by Arvind Subramanian said the expansion was overestimated between 2011 and 2017. Rather than growing at about 7 per cent a year in that period, the actual growth was about 4.5 per cent, said the study published by the Center for International Development at Harvard University.

"India must restore the reputational damage suffered in data generation across the board, from GDP to employment to government accounts. At the same time, the entire methodology and implementation for GDP estimation must be revisited by an independent task force," the ex-CEA had said.