Thread by @ieuditmisra

Finally, PM @narendramodi has formally accepted that India's economic growth had slowed down. But he is economising on the truth and misleading the country when he suggests that our growth momentum was lost due to #Covid. It was already lost. Thread👇

indianexpress.com/article/busine…

So a good starting point would be this piece on the govt's own economic growth data for 2019-20. If you read this, you will understand two things:

1> That India's growth had slowed sharply between April 2019 and March 2020. (contd)

indianexpress.com/article/explai…

2> That government's unwillingness to accept that growth was faltering led to a situation where policy responses were bizarre to say the least. The massive corporate tax cut -- which cost the govt Rs 1.5 lakh crore in tax revenues -- is a case in point. (contd)

Those who want to listen to a podcast on this can check out... (contd) indianexpress.com/audio/3-things…

As the written piece above points out, Indian manufacturing CONTRACTED for three consecutive quarters -- that's 9 straight months -- between July 2019 and March 2020. But even as this weakness was becoming apparent, govt continued to maintain that India will grow at 8.5% (contd)

By the time we reached the last quarter (Jan to March), the growth slowdown was so massive and widespread that if one kept two sectors of the economy out of the calculation -- the govt and agriculture -- rest of the economy grew by just 1%. Chart Source: @Nomura

And here's the really embarrassing part about the growth in 2019-20: Even this lousy annual growth of 4.2% is considered to be an overestimate.
For details, read this (contd.) indianexpress.com/article/explai…

Now spare a moment at this table and ask yourself what shape it makes?
Chances are you might be visualising a "V" or "U" at any rate.
Please also think the year which had demonetisation and ask yourself how things went from there. (contd).

I would request readers to pay special attention to the year 2018-19. In that year, the govt claimed the economy grew by 7.2%. This was misleading but it allowed govt to deflect criticism. A year later, that growth was revised to 6.1%.

Citizens should ask (contd).

If growth was slowing down this fast in 2018-19, why did we not do anything then? Or in 2019-20? Or at least accept that growth had slowed down in 2018-19?

Answer lies in the political economy. Sandwiched between 2018-19 & 2019-20 was General Election 2019 (contd.)

Which government goes into a General Election accepting that growth momentum has been lost. That unemployment is at a 4-decade high (@someshjha7 's brilliant expose). Or that absolute "employment" actually fell for the first time in our history. indianexpress.com/article/busine…

The truly sordid aspect of this decline in "Employment" and increase in "Unemployment" -- the two are different -- were the youth.

Worst part -- the more educated they got, the more unemployment they faced.

Please do keep in mind the dates (contd)

indianexpress.com/article/india/…

So all this is happening and information is being either suppressed or denied or undermined even as the govt completely ignores the economy and focusses on "criminalising" Triple Talaq and the farcical #CAA_NRC_NPR issue.
While Indians slept, global investors worried (contd)

So in November 2019, @MoodysInvSvc Moody's, which historically had been most optimistic about India's economic growth prospects, fired a warning shot.

It changed the outlook from "stable" to "negative".

In 2017, Moody's had upgraded Ind's rating in the hope (contd).

In the hope that India would bring about economic reforms and economic growth would increase.

But, as GDP growth shows, reform implementation was lousy and growth rate slipped since 2017 even as govt and finl sector health worsened.

Yesterday, Moody's downgraded Ind (contd).

On June 1, Moody's downgraded India's rating and it pointed out that it is because of lack of reforms and falling growth EVEN BEFORE #COVID19Pandemic hit Indian economy.

Read story for details.

This #COVID19 aspect is crucial to understand for readers

indianexpress.com/article/explai…

Because #ModiSarkar only thrust now is to blame all economic growth deceleration on #Covid.

That's why ministers are saying things like... and why the PM now feels relaxed to proclaim that "growth will be back"(contd).

indianexpress.com/article/india/…

By the way, i forgot to share an analysis by @SriniSivabalan which found that:

"In the first year of Modi’s 2nd term, India has erased more shareholder wealth than any other country on the planet, except Brexit-swayed Britain".

bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

Ok. That's enough for today. Thanks for reading through if you reached till here.

I hope readers understand the difference between "stating facts" and "spreading negativity".