WEB EXCLUSIVE: Survey points to lower deficits

The pre-Budget Economic Survey, tabled in Parliament today, may well have revealed Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's revised fiscal deficit numbers for the current year. The fiscal deficit for 2010-11, the Survey says, will be 4.8% of the gross domestic product or GDP, much lower than Mukherjee' Budget estimate of 5.5%.

Even the revenue deficit for the current fiscal year is shown at 3.5%of GDP, lower than the Budget estimate of 4% as presented by Mukherjee in February 2010. Similarly, the Survey shows primary deficit for 2010-11 at 1.7% of GDP, compared to the Budget estimate of 1.9%of GDP.

The substantially improved fiscal state, from what Mukherjee had projected at the time he presented the 2010-11 Budget, has been largely possible because of a 20% nominal growth in GDP to Rs 78 lakh crore in the current year, compared to Rs 65.5 lakh crore in the previous year, and a spurt in revenue growth from taxes and sale of 3G spectrum.