Fiscal deficit to revenue target: Crunching the Budget numbers

With GST revenues coming well below expectations, the Centre failed to meet its budgeted fiscal deficit target yet again. As against the target of 3.3 per cent of GDP in FY19, the deficit was higher at 3.4 per cent. For the next year too, the fiscal deficit has been pegged at 3.4 per cent of GDP. As shown in chart 3, the Centre now expects to bring down the deficit to 3 per cent of GDP by FY21. The Centre has maintained the revenue deficit target at 2.2 per cent of GDP for FY20, projecting it to decline to 1.5 per cent by FY22, as shown in chart 4. On the other hand, the primary deficit is expected to be brought down to zero by FY22, from 0.2 per cent of GDP in FY20, as seen in chart 5. The Centre also hopes to bring down its debt to 43.4 per cent in FY22, from 48.8 per cent currently, as seen in chart 6.

StatsGuru is a weekly feature. Every Monday, Business Standard guides you through the numbers you need to know to make sense of the headlines