India’s economy is expected to expand

India’s economy is expected to expand by five per cent for the financial year ending March 2013, its lowest in a decade.

India’s average growth between 2004-2011 was 8.3 per cent.

Last year, the economy grew by 6.2 per cent in 2011-12, The Central Statistics Office (CSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation said in an advanced estimates released here today.

The figure is much lower than the projections by Reserve Bank of India and Finance Minister, P. Chidambaram of 5.5 per cent and 5.9 per cent, respectively.

India’s gross domestic product grew by 5.3 per cent for the July-Sept period last year, lower than 5.5 per cent in the first quarter (April-June).

CSO said the sectors which were expected to register a growth rate of over five per cent were construction, trade, hotel, transport and communication, financing, insurance, real estate, business services and community, social and personal services.

However, slow growth is seen in the sectors of agriculture, forestry and fishing (1.8 per cent), manufacturing (1.9 per cent) and electricity, gas & water supply (4.9 per cent).

The growth in the mining and quarrying sector is estimated to be 0.4 per cent.