Subhash Garg had called new GDP series 'more representative', 'accurate': Amit Malviya shares March article

BJP's former IT cell head Amit Malviya on Thursday hit out at former finance secretary Subhash Garg for questioning India's latest GDP growth figures. He accused him of reversing his position on the new GDP series.

Malviya said Garg had described the revised GDP series as more representative and accurate shortly after it was released in March, but was now calling the same methodology "fiddled".

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What Garg Said In March

Malviya referred to a piece Garg published in The Quint on March 5, barely a week after the new GDP series was released.

According to Malviya, Garg had then described the new series as "much more representative of current production and consumption in the country" and said it "can, therefore, be taken as more accurate."

Garg had also described the downward revision in nominal GDP as "very bad news, which the new GDP series has honestly communicated", Malviya said. "Today, he has completely inverted that assessment."

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The BJP leader argued that Garg was now using the old series' higher GDP figure as a benchmark while questioning the lower figure under the new series. "The numbers did not change. Garg's narrative did," he said.

"This is not a disagreement over methodology. It is an extraordinary reversal of position on the very same GDP revision within months," Malviya added.

He said the new series was considered "more accurate" and had "honestly communicated" bad news when it supported Garg's argument, but its methodology was now being described as "fiddled".

"This is less economic analysis and more motivated reasoning. We now know why he was likely ousted as Finance Secretary," Malviya said.

MoSPI reported on August 31 that India's economy grew 7.8% in the first quarter of FY27, covering April to June.

Garg, however, argued that the economy had actually grown by 2.6%. He later changed that figure to over 5%. He attributed the difference to the downward revision in current-price GDP from ₹86 lakh crore to ₹80 lakh crore, which he said had propped up the latest growth number.