Through the economic data fog

There are broadly two views on the Indian economy. One is untrammelled boosterism, the dream of becoming a $5 trillion economy, delivered by an ostensible era of perpetual prosperity, supported by a set of rosy data. Another view is sceptical of such an inference based on a different data set. There are enough data points to support both sides, which makes for, what I call, an economic data fog, leaving us confused about where the economy is truly headed. Consider the growth of gross domestic product (GDP). GDP growth is seen to be the biggest and the most important piece of data that points to the overall trajectory of the economy. For the first three months of this year, nominal