Fiscal deficit between April and May moved up to Rs 73,201 crore or 54.9% of the annual target. The deficit figure has already crossed the halfway stage for the entire year because of increased social spending.
The government has set a fiscal deficit target of Rs 1,33,000 lakh crore or 2.5% of gross domestic product for the 2008/09 fiscal year - lower than 2.8% in the previous year.
Fiscal deficit is the difference between the government's total expenditure and total receipts. The gap is financed by borrowings from the Reserve Bank of India and the markets
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Current a/c deficit narrows in Jan-March
Mumbai: The country's current account deficit narrowed to $1.04 billion in the January-March quarter from a revised deficit of $5.12 billion in the December quarter, the Reserve Bank of India said on Monday.
The deficit for the financial year ended March 2008 widened to $17.4 billion, or 1.5% of gross domestic product, from $9.8 billion, or 1.1 percent of GDP, in FY07.
The Reserve Bank of India said the balance of payments surplus
The trade deficit on a balance of payments basis narrowed to $23.8 billion in the March quarter from $25.1 billion in October-December.Net invisible receipts, which includes exports of software services and remittances by overseas Indians, were $22.8 billion in the quarter, up from $20 billion in the previous quarter.
"The current account deficit for January-March quarter suggests that the usual seasonal increase in invisibles has not kept pace with the rise in trade deficit this year, largely due to rising oil import bill," said Sonal Varma, an economist at Lehman Brothers.
India imports about 70% of its oil needs, and oil is the country's largest import.
Varma said oil prices and weakening demand for exports would widen India's trade deficit further, forecasting the current account deficit to widen to 3% of gross domestic product in FY09 from 1.5% in FY08.
Earlier this month, Arvind Virmani, the finance ministry's chief economic advisor, said there was only a very low probability the current account deficit would exceed 2.5 percent of GDP over the next four years."India should still get sufficient capital inflows to cover the current account deficit, but the overall balance of payments surplus is likely to moderate to $18 billion in FY09 from $92.2 billion," Varma said.
A current account deficit indicates the economy is drawing upon the savings of other economies to fund its investment.
Source: UTVi.com