What happened
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Thursday, 15 October 2026, that India’s updated method of calculating gross domestic product (GDP) follows good practice and fits its advice. Krishna Srinivasan, Director of the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department, called the GDP base revision a “welcome development”, according to reports by PTI carried in The Hindu and BusinessLine.
Speaking to reporters in Bangkok, he said the changes match the guidance given to India, including from the IMF’s statistics department. He added that India had issued a note explaining the revisions.
“In terms of GDP numbers, what they have done is consistent with good practices,” Srinivasan said, adding there is always room for improvement.
He also asked that the work done by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) to improve GDP statistics be recognised.
What it means for you
GDP is the total value of goods and services an economy produces. A GDP series needs a base year, a reference period against which later growth is measured. When the base year or method changes, past figures are restated, so growth rates for earlier periods can differ from what was published before.
The IMF’s comments are a view on the technical soundness of the method. They do not settle the political argument, but they are one outside assessment of how the numbers are compiled.
Srinivasan also spoke about the rupee. He described India as having entered the energy shock from a position of strength and said it has handled the situation well. He said weakness in the currency should not be taken as a sign of economic failure, because the exchange rate depends on global interest rates, investor risk appetite and oil prices. In his view, it does not show growth and the currency moving apart in any real sense.
The IMF’s Regional Economic Outlook for Asia and Pacific, released the same day, lists India among emerging economies whose currencies came under pressure after the energy shock. It says that pressure has partly eased over the past few months and notes that India was among the economies that stepped into foreign exchange markets.
If you send money to India or hold rupee assets, you can check conversions with our currency converter.
Background
Last month, the government released GDP growth of 7.8% for the June quarter, better than expected. Former Finance Secretary S C Garg contested it, claiming the data was artificially boosted by compressing the previous year’s figures. Opposition parties took up the claim and questioned the integrity of the data.
Chief Economic Advisor V Anantha Nageswaran called Garg’s approach “cherry-picking” of data. He said the latest figures were compiled with the financial year ending March 2023 as the new base, and that the change in methodology led to revisions in last year’s quarterly data.
