India’s former chief economic adviser has concluded that the country’s economic growth rate was significantly overestimated between 2011 and 2017, adding to concerns that official statistics have masked a sharp slowdown in the economy. 

Arvind Subramanian, a veteran economist who advised the Indian government from 2014 to 2018, said that the country’s average annual growth in gross domestic product between 2011 and 2017 was in fact around 4.5 per cent, against official estimates of 7 per cent. 

His findings were presented in a research paper published by the Center for International Development at Harvard University’s Kennedy School, which found that the correlations between 17 independent indicators of economic activity and GDP broke down after 2011, leaving India an outlier compared to other countries’ economic data.