Counterattack by former Chief Economic Advisor: IMF’s India growth estimates ‘consistently wrong’

Krishnamurthy Subramanian, who used to be India’s Chief Economic Advisor, got into a bit of a squabble with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). He said that the IMF’s estimates about how much India’s economy would grow were often wrong. He pointed out that when he was in charge, he predicted India’s economy would grow by more than 7%, and it did. He mentioned his prediction from September 2021, where he said India would see more than 7% growth in the decade, and the actual numbers turned out to be pretty close. For example, in the financial year 2021-2022, the economy grew by 9.7%, and in 2022-2023, it was 7%. He even gave an estimate for 2023-2024, saying it would be around 7.6%.

Subramanian compared his predictions with the IMF’s estimates, showing where they didn’t match up. He said that for the financial year 2023-2024, the IMF’s guesses were lower than what actually happened. He mentioned that the IMF staff predicted 6.1% growth in November 2022 and January 2023, then lowered it to 5.9% in April 2023, and then raised it again to 6.3% in November 2023. But the actual growth, according to the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), turned out to be 7.6%. He thought it might even be revised to around 8%.

Subramanian is now an Executive Director at the IMF in Washington, DC. He took over from another economist, Surjit Bhalla. When he was the Chief Economic Advisor in India, he was succeeded by V Anantha Nageswaran, who is the current advisor. Subramanian basically argued that his predictions were better than the IMF’s, and the data supports his claim.