Council: India economy to grow at 6.4 percent

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NEW DELHI, April 24 (UPI) -- India's economic growth this fiscal year, which began April 1, is expected to rise 6.4 percent, an economic review report said.

The report by the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister cited improvements in the key sectors for its forecast.

"Growth and, more particularly, industrial growth has slowed. But the decline appears to have bottomed out. Overall economic growth is expected to rise to 6.4 per cent in 2013-14 from 5 percent in the previous year," report carried on the council's website stated.

The previous growth rate was the slowest in a decade, partly due to the global slowdown.

The coalition government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has trying a number of reforms to boost the economy, which has been hobbled by inflation, fiscal and current account deficits and other factors.

C. Rangarajan, who heads the council, said the Indian economy is expected to grow at a faster rate.

"The very high level of investment rate that we have even now gives us the hope that if we take action for speedy implementation of projects we can achieve the higher rate of growth quickly even in the short term," The Times of India quoted him as saying.

The council report said global economic growth is projected to pick up this year but would continue to remain at modest levels.

"In such a scenario India's projected growth rate of 6.4 percent is relatively high and respectable," the report said.

India's current account deficit was projected to be 4.7 percent of the gross domestic product from 5.1 percent last year.

Inflation this year was expected to be around 6 percent.

"Inflation continues to remain high, but there are definite signs that headline wholesale price index (which is used to measure inflation) inflation is coming down," the report said.