Summary The economy will grow 7.4 percent in the year through to March.
NEW DELHI (AFP) - India forecast its economy will accelerate 7.4 percent this financial year, data showed Monday, under a revised formula for calculating gross domestic product that has baffled analysts since its release last month.
The economy will grow 7.4 percent in the year through to March, the statistics ministry announced, after earlier revising the forecast expansion to 6.9 percent from 4.7 percent by using the new formula.
The economy also grew at an annualised 7.5 percent in the three months to December, a ministry official said at a press conference.
India had been thought to be struggling through the worst economic slowdown since the 1980s at below five percent growth, far too low to generate jobs for millions of young people.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi stormed to power at general elections last May on pledges to reform and revive the ailing economy and attract much-needed foreign investment.
But the new formula, which changes the way gross domestic product is calculated and which officials say is closer to international standards, shows the economy has instead been expanding fast.
Analysts however say the new data does not correlate with other economic indicators, including industrial production.
"I am puzzled by the GDP growth numbers and, consequently, all the constituent elements that went into constructing it," Arvind Subramanian, the finance ministry s top economic adviser, said in an interview with the Business Standard newspaper this month.
"We have to be very careful in using these numbers for policy-making."
Uncertainty surrounding the new data comes as Finance Minister Arun Jaitley is set to unveil the national budget on February 28.
