The BBC article’s headline, “Indian billionaires buy foreign companies as growth slows at home”, is quite revealing of the underlying agenda of portraying even lucrative Indian mergers and acquisitions as more of an outcome of domestic failures than strong balance sheets.
At its core, GDP is not a directly observable number but an estimate constructed from multiple data sources, surveys, and statistical techniques. In a country like India, where a significant portion of economic activity occurs in the informal sector, measuring output with precision is inherently challenging.
Predictably, the opposition parties and the extended anti-Modi cabal have seized the opportunity to attack the Modi government and accuse it of gross economic mismanagement.
"We are contributing about 18%, which is more than the US where the contribution is expected to be much less – about 11% or something. We are doing very well and we will continue to improve further," the RBI governor said.
The flawed ‘analysis’ by Anil Swarup was amplified by veteran business journalist Sucheta Dalal who in an X post published on 4th December said, “Some perspective for those wearing saffron tinted glasses. Try thinking when you cheer a govt that kills faith in institutions/regulators (SEBI), makes it hard to reclaim your own money (@authorityiepf @socialepfo @RBI), extracts 18% GST on essentials!”