Government estimates total debt to rise to 185 trillion rupees in fiscal year 2025

The growth rate of PFCE at current prices in 2022–2023 and 2023–2024 is 14.2 per cent and 8.5 per cent, respectively.

3 minutes of reading Last updated: July 29, 2024 | 23:46 IST

The government estimates that its debt, including foreign loans valued at the current exchange rate and liabilities to public accounts and others, will rise to 185 trillion rupees, or 56.8 percent of GDP, in the current fiscal year.

The total debt at the end of March 2024 stood at Rs 171.78 trillion, or 58.2 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha on Monday.

According to the International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook April 2024, India’s gross domestic product at current prices has already reached $3.57 trillion in 2023-24, he added.

Replying to another question, Chaudhary said the growth rate of private consumption expenditure (PFCE) at constant prices in 2022-23 and 2023-24 would be 6.8 per cent and 4 per cent, respectively, citing the provisional GDP estimates for 2023-24 released by the National Statistics Office.

He added that the growth rate of PFCE at current prices in 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 will be 14.2 per cent and 8.5 per cent, respectively, and the ratio of PFCE to GDP at current prices in 2023-2024 will be 60.3 per cent.

In response to another question, Chaudhary said the normal net borrowing ceiling (NBC) of states for 2021-22 has been set at 4 per cent of gross domestic product (GSDP), as recommended by the 15th Finance Commission.

He said that from the normal NBC of 4 per cent of the projected GSDP for 2021-22, a debt ceiling of 0.50 per cent of the projected GSDP has been earmarked for additional capital expenditure by the states during 2021-22, for which a target level of capital expenditure has been fixed for each state.

In another response, he stated that the federal government, under the “Special Assistance” line item in the “Transfers to States” grant requests, provides grants to states to cover obligations beyond this area for which funds have not been budgeted, as well as other need-based assistance to states.

Further, NITI Aayog in its report titled “Report on Development Assistance to Andhra Pradesh under Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act (APRA), 2014” dated December 1, 2015 recommended “…a total assistance of Rs 2,100 crore to seven backward districts of Andhra Pradesh at the rate of Rs 300 crore per district.

Based on the recommendations of NITI Aayog, he said the Department of Expenditure has so far allocated an amount of Rs 1,750 crore under APRA, 2014 for the development of seven backward districts of Andhra Pradesh.

First published: July 29, 2024 | 23:39 IST