This is India’s first ever slowdown at a time of political as well as macroeconomic stability | The Indian Express

This is India’s first ever slowdown at a time of political as well as macroeconomic stability | The Indian Express

Written by Harish Damodaran |Updated: November 30, 2019 12:03:11 pm

This is India’s first ever slowdown at a time of political as well as macroeconomic stability

Unlike all the earlier downturns whose precursors/triggers were supply-side constraints in food and forex, macroeconomic imprudence or external shocks, what we are now experiencing is more of a ‘Western-style’ slowdown exacerbated by internal policy misadventures.

The slowdowns till the Eighties were mostly a result of drought-induced agricultural contractions, wars or balance of payments (BoP) pressures. (Illustration by C R Sasikumar)

Sharp and protracted economic slowdowns aren’t new to India. Since Independence, there have been at least eight episodes of significant GDP growth rate declines over two years or more — 1961-62 and 1962-63, 1965-66 and 1966-67, 1971-72 and 1972-73, 1984-85 to 1987-88, 1990-91 to 1992-93, 2000-01 to 2002-03, 2012-13 and 2013-14, and the current one from 2018-19.