NEW DELHI: The World Bank on Tuesday retained India's real GDP growth rate for 2021-22 at 8.3 per cent while revising the 2022-23 growth rate by 120 basis points to 8.7 per cent. In its latest Global Economic Prospect report, the World Bank says that India’s economy is expected to expand by 8.3 per cent in fiscal year 2021-22 (ending March 2022), unchanged from last June’s forecast.
It says that India's economy should benefit from the resumption of contact-intensive services, and ongoing but narrowing monetary and fiscal policy support. In 2022-23 and 2023-24 growth has been upgraded to 8.7 per cent and 6.8 per cent respectively, to reflect an improving investment outlook with private investment, particularly manufacturing, benefiting from the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme, and increases in infrastructure investment.
Fuel demand up by 0.4 per cent in December
India's fuel demand witnessed a growth of 0.4 per cent in December 2021 compared with the same month last year, according to data from the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC). The total petroleum product consumption in December 2021 stood at 18.43 million tonnes, compared with 18.36 million tonnes in the same month last year.
However, the consumption is 7.6 per cent higher month-on-month but is still 2.7 per cent lower than pre-COVID-19 levels of 2019.