India’s federal fiscal deficit crosses full year budget target in four months

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s federal fiscal deficit in the four months to end July stood at 8.21 trillion rupees ($111.7 billion), or 103.1% of the budgeted target for the current fiscal year, government data showed on Monday.

Net tax receipts were 2.03 trillion rupees, while total expenditure was 10.5 trillion rupees, the data showed, indicating the government had stepped up its spending to combat the impact of the coronavirus.

The deficit is predicted to cross 7.5% of GDP in the 2020/21 fiscal year that began in April, private economists said, from initial government estimates of 3.5%, mainly due to a sharp economic contraction triggered by the pandemic.

($1 = 73.4780 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Manoj Kumar and Nidhi Verma; Editing by Toby Chopra)