Expect growth to improve: Industry

With India's growth improving to 6.3 per cent in the July-September quarter, industry bodies on Thursday said the economy is on a solid recovery path and may fare better in the second-half of the 2017-18 fiscal as businesses adjust to the goods and services tax (GST).

"The rebound in GDP growth to 6.3 per cent, after the uninspiring performance of the previous quarter, is noteworthy and a great confidence booster," said CII Director General Chandrajit Banerjee. "The revival of the GDP growth print reinforces the perception that the economy is in a robust recovery phase and the short-term disruptions caused by demonetisation and GST are behind us."

He said that he is optimistic that the economic performance will be better in the second-half as companies move to execute projects because of improved demand. "The 6.3 per cent growth in GDP for the second quarter comes as a big relief to India Inc against the backdrop of quite subdued performance of the previous quarter even if the economic expansion is yet to recover its robustness," said Assocham Secretary General D S Rawat. "Manufacturing has emerged as the bright spot at 7 per cent, but agriculture remains an area of concern with a mere 1.7 per cent (expansion) in the second quarter against 2.3 per cent in the previous quarter.

Setbacks in the agri performance can have a cascading impact on consumer inflation," he added.