The National Statistical Office on Monday released the GDP estimates for the first quarter (ending June 30) for the current financial year, and showed that the economic growth contracted by 23.9 percent.
First time after many decades, all eight segments saw a contraction, except the agriculture sector in April-June quarter of 2020.
India’s private final consumption expenditure (PFCE) for the period fell 54.3 percent, compared to a 56.4 percent growth in the same period a year ago.
Discretionary spending has been hit badly with the sales coming to a grinding halt for a few companies. It is believed that the consumer segments have been hit hard because of COVID19 pandemic.
The infrastructure data showed the decline was less than 10 percent and with the exception of cement and steel, all other sectors have done reasonably well.
Experts said that the marginal Agriculture growth is not enough to overcome the damages caused during the Q1 in the other segments.
The agriculture sector, aided by plentiful summer rains, recorded a growth of 3.4 percent in the first quarter of 2020-21 from 3 percent last year.
Experts are of the opinion that the decline was expected as there was a lockdown for more than half of the quarter due to COVID19 pandemic.