The ongoing furore over the new GDP series is surprising as it comes six months after it was originally released, said Saurabh Garg, Secretary in the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI). Garg further said the old numbers — that have now been revised down — should not be termed overestimates.
“Saying overestimation gives the impression that there was a systematic bias. That’s alluding a bit much,” Garg told The Indian Express in an interview. “…it’s not an overestimation. GDP is an estimation and you make estimations based on the best data available. When the 2011-12 and 2004-05 series were estimated, certain indicators were used and later changed, leading to better estimates. Now you have even better estimates.”
On August 31, MoSPI released GDP data for the first quarter of 2026-27, which showed growth was 7.8%, well above what most economists had anticipated. According to Garg, this higher-than-expected growth print may be the reason for the criticism.
“Maybe my sense is that no one expected a 7.8% number. When your a priori assumption does not meet the data, and the data is showing that there is no reason to doubt the numbers, perhaps we should not dismiss the GDP data simply because it does not conform to prior expectations,” he said.
“Forget the GDP data for a moment and look at the real economy data. And that’s partly because government policy interventions have helped support real economic activity and thereby strengthened economic resilience.”
When asked about comments that India’s rapid growth is not being ‘felt’ on the ground, Garg argued that while GDP is an important indicator, there are “other factors, uncertainties, the global situation” which determine how each individual ‘feels’ about economic indicators.
“It’s like someone mentioning ‘We don’t feel the inflation, we feel inflation (rate) should be higher’. So, individually, how you see the prices might be different from when they are aggregated across the country and across different areas,” he said.
Pointing to several high-frequency, or monthly, consumption and production indicators such as those for steel, cement, electricity, and automobiles, Garg said any comparison between old series and new series was “unwarranted”. The new GDP series is built on a wider set of indicators and surveys which provide a more comprehensive picture of the economy. This, he said, makes the new series the best so far.
“Every series, at that time, is the best series. There is no doubt (that the new series is the best) because we are using the best available data,” Garg said, adding that the last 10 years have seen numerous new data sources. This is unlikely to be repeated in the next five years or so when the next GDP base revision is done.
“Earlier, Goods and Services Tax, Periodic Labour Force Survey, Annual Survey of Unincorporated Sector Enterprises (ASUSE), and Public Financial Management System were not there… Digital data like e-Vahan was not there. This digitisation push, I think, has really changed the complexion of data availability and data sources. That is what is getting reflected.”
Dismissing the criticism from former Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian that MoSPI does not have good and timely data on the informal economy, Garg said ASUSE and PLFS figures, not proxies, are being used even for quarterly GDP estimates.
While released in February 2026, the new GDP series — which has 2022-23 as the base year and uses several updated methods and new data sources — has come under fire from various quarters, sparked by comments from former finance secretary Subhash Chandra Garg that the 7.8% real growth rate in April-June was only possibly because of a reduction in the year-ago GDP data.
According to Subhash Chandra Garg, nominal GDP growth in April-June should have been 2.6%, and not 10.3%, and real growth close to zero. He arrived at these numbers after comparing data from the old and new GDP series.
Calling this debate “unnecessary”, MoSPI secretary Garg said he cannot think of any reasonable criticism of the new GDP data as the government had “made the best use of data, digital data, and surveys”. The primary reason for the downward revision in nominal GDP in previous years, he said, is the transition from proxy-based estimates in old series to direct, empirical annual surveys for the informal sector in the new series.
Rejecting criticism that MoSPI has not disclosed various aspects and methods of calculating the new GDP series, Garg said all the relevant data — from the Producer Price Index (PPI) to the new Index of Industrial Production (IIP) series — and technical issues were made public months ago and the keenly-awaited ‘Sources and Methods’ document would only be a compilation.
“The Sources and Methods will only compile the three booklets we had brought out on the (new) methodology. It will put it in one place and compile that this is what we are finally using, the various options we looked at, and what are the recommendations.”
The new IIP series was released in May and output PPI data starting 2022-23 was made public in June. Before that, in February, MoSPI had released three reports by sub-committees of the Advisory Committee on National Accounts Statistics. These reports were on ‘Methodological Improvement for the Base Revision of GDP’, ‘Constant Price Estimates’, and ‘Incorporation of New Data Sources, Rates and Ratios’.
Saurabh Garg (Photo: MoSPI website/ Enhanced by Gemini), 
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