“India is in the process of becoming the fourth largest economy, and I am personally confident that will happen by the end of 2025 because we need (data) of all 12 months GDP to say that, you know, to assert that. So to say till then, it remains a forecast,” Virmani told PTI.
Asked to comment on NITI Aayog CEO BVR Subrahmanyam’s remark that India has become the fourth largest economy in the world, the eminent economist said: “So this is a complicated question, and I really do not know what the words anybody has used. Perhaps there was some word which was missed or something.”
Citing IMF data, Subrahmanyam, last week, said that the size of the Indian economy today is larger than Japan’s.
“We are the fourth largest economy as I speak. We are a USD 4 trillion economy as I speak,” the NITI Aayog CEO had said.
It is only the US, China and Germany which are larger than India, and if we stick to what is being planned and what is being thought through, in 2.5-3 years, we will be the third largest economy,” Subrahmanyam had said. Explaining further, Virmani said, “When we discuss the size of economies publicly, we generally use US dollar current prices.” Virmani further pointed out that ‘when we compare economy, we generally do it in terms of annual GDP’.
Virmani said IMF in its WEO report released in April gave a precise number, which showed that India’s GDP for the full year 2025, would become higher than that of Japan.
” I would say that I am pretty confident that that will happen, but the exact data will probably not be available till January or February, because we are talking about the whole year,” he observed.
India’s nominal GDP for 2025 (FY26) is expected to be USD 4.187 trillion marginally more than the likely GDP of Japan which is estimated at USD 4.186 trillion, the IMF had said.
According to IMF data, India’s per capita income has doubled from USD 1,438 in 2013-14 to USD 2,880 in 2025.
Content Source: economictimes.indiatimes.com