Essential upgrades: On upgrades to India’s statistical databases

The government has, in recent months, implemented several long-overdue but welcome upgrades to India’s statistical databases. Wide-ranging, they cover the way the country measures Gross Domestic Product (GDP), industrial production, and price changes at the retail, wholesale, and producer levels. These updates have not only made India’s key economic statistics more representative of reality, but have also brought them in line with international best practices. The most basic change across all indices has been the updating of base years. Until recently, the base years for GDP , the Consumer Price Index (CPI), Wholesale Price Index (WPI), and Index of Industrial Production (IIP) were either 2011 or 2012. As such, these measures were significantly outdated and less reflective of reality with each passing year. In February, the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) released the new series of national accounts data, including GDP, with a base year of 2022-23. The new series incorporates methodological improvements and new data sources, making it more granular and robust. Some of these, such as the double-deflator approach, have long been demanded by statisticians and international bodies, including the IMF.