Aggregating all measures taken by the Indian government as well as its Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the country has so far announced measures of over Rs 15 lakh crore, leaving Rs 4.25 lakh crore worth of announcements remaining to hit the Rs 20 lakh crore mark announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a British brokerage said.
“From a monetary support perspective, the government and the RBI have made announcements of over Rs 15.75 lakh crore, leaving Rs 4.25 lakh crore more of announcements to be done to achieve the PM’s target,” it said.
According to a report by Barclays Plc, published on Thursday, the finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the second part of the stimulus support measures total led to Rs 3.16 lakh crore if the subventions scheme worth Rs 70,000 is linked subsidy scheme are factored in, and considering minister’s announcement made on Wednesday, the total support given so far hits Rs 8.4 lakh crore. This simply means that the government is yet to announce few additional support worth Rs 4.25 lakh crore to Hit its target of Rs 20 lakh crore target.
Sitharaman on Wednesday announced, schemes worth Rs 5.94 lakh crore, which included Rs 3 lakh crore support to the MSMEs.
“This leaves the government with room for another Rs 1.24 lakh crore of incremental spending, on our estimates. We continue to believe the government may end up with a fiscal deficit of close to 6 per cent GDP during FY21,” its analysts said.
The report also said that the actual hit to government finances from the measures announced by Sitharaman in the last two days was pegged at Rs 66,500 crore or 0.34 per cent of the GDP.
From an “actual fiscal impact” perspective, the moves announced on Thursday focussing on migrants, urban poor and farmers will cost only Rs 11,000 crore, the brokerage said, adding it has so far taken a hit of Rs 66,500 crore only.
“The actual fiscal impact of today’s steps will only be Rs 11,000 crore, which brings the total cost of additional incentives announced to Rs 66,500 crore (0.34 per cent of GDP), accounting for steps taken yesterday as well,” it said.
“This leaves the government with room for another Rs 1.24 lakh crore of incremental spending, on our estimates. We continue to believe the government may end up with a fiscal deficit of close to 6 per cent GDP during FY21,” its analysts said.
It can be noted that some analysts, including house economists at SBI, have been pegging the fiscal deficit to come in at a higher level of over 7.9 per cent as against the budget target of 3.5 per cent due to the massive spending that the government is undertaking.
The brokerage said the move to use technological solutions to implement the ‘one nation one ration card’ concept for public distribution system will save money on food subsidies for the government, as it has the potential to plug leakages.