Mumbai: Maharashtra is expected to record a growth rate of 7.5 per cent in 2018-19. This is the rosy picture forecast in the economic survey released on Monday. However, all economic indicators do not make for cheerful reading.
As per the survey, crop production is expected to witness a negative growth of 8 per cent in the 2018-19 fiscal owing to severe drought in several parts of the state. Agriculture and the allied sector, as a whole, is expected to grow at 0.4 per cent, a decline, as against last year's 3.1 per cent rise, the survey states.
The industries sector is also underperforming. There has been a decline of 0.7 per cent, compared to that last year. The reassuring aspect is that the service sector has risen by 9.2 per cent, better than last year's 8.1 per cent.
More worrisome, the fiscal deficit is expected to be double of that in the last year’s budget; the fiscal deficit in 2017-2018 was Rs 23,961 crore and as per revised estimates it will be Rs 56,053 crores in 2018-19.
Maharashtra state Finance Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar tabled the survey on Monday on the first day of the monsoon session of the Assembly. Maharashtra's per capita income during 2018-19 was Rs 1,91,827, trailing behind Karnataka’s Rs 2,07,062 and Telangana’s Rs 2,06,107. The per capita income in 2018-19 is, however, higher by 8.9 per cent, as against Rs 1,76,102 in 2017-18.
Power generation has increased in 2018-19 by 8,344 Million Units (MU) which is a 6.6 per cent growth, as against that in 2017-18. The consumption of power has grown by 10.3 per cent in the industrial sector in 2017-18, as against that in 2016-17. The per capita consumption of power was 964 units, as against 907 units in 2016-17.
