Informist Poll
India's GDP growth likely slowed to 7.5% in Oct-Dec
This story was originally published at 17:45 IST on 24 February 2026
Register to read our real-time news.Informist, Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2026
By Shubham Rana
NEW DELHI – India's GDP growth is likely to have slowed to 7.5% in the December quarter from a six-quarter high of 8.2% in the September quarter, according to the median of estimates by 14 economists in an Informist Poll. The December quarter GDP data will be the first based on the new series, under which the base year has been updated to 2022-23 (Apr-Mar) from FY12.
While growth is seen slowing in the December quarter, at 7.5% it would still be higher than the growth recorded a year ago of 6.4%. The Indian economy grew 7.8% in the April quarter and growth averaged 8.0% in the first half of FY26. Economists' estimates in the Informist Poll for the December quarter GDP growth ranged from 7.0% to 8.7%.
The Economic Survey for FY26 said the GDP growth in the December quarter is seen at 7?sed on a nowcast model developed by the economic division in the Department of Economic Affairs. The Reserve Bank of India in December had projected Oct-Dec GDP growth at 7.0%.
Among the three broad sectors, agriculture sector growth is likely to have held up in the December quarter around the 3.5% mark achieved in the September quarter. Industrial sector growth is expected to have moderated from 7.7% in Jul-Sept because of slower electricity production, economists said. The services sector, on the other hand, is seen growing at around 9% in the December quarter, slightly slower than the 9.2% growth recorded in the trailing quarter.
Gross value added--which some economists consider a more reliable indicator of economic activity than GDP--is also expected to have slowed in the December quarter but will still outpace GDP growth. Economists polled by Informist saw gross-value-added growth for the December quarter at 7.9%, lower than the seven-quarter high of 8.1% in Jul-Sept.
Gross-value-added growth is expected to be higher than GDP growth because of lower net taxes--the difference between indirect taxes and subsidies. Net taxes "will decline materially in growth, as the GST (goods and services tax) cuts impact net collections," BofA Securities India said in a report.
"From the expenditure perspective, growth in household consumption is likely to improve materially reflecting the GST tax cut impact, while we also see inventory decumulation and investment growth moderation," BofA Securities said.
NEW GDP SERIES
The statistics ministry will release GDP data for the December quarter at 1600 IST Friday. It will also release the second advance estimate for FY26 and revised estimates for FY25 and FY24. All these estimates will be based on the new GDP series, which has FY23 as the base year.
The first advance estimate of GDP growth in FY26 is 7.4%. The provisional estimate of FY25 growth is 6.5% while the first revised estimate for FY24 growth is 9.2%.
The new GDP series will include data from new sources such as GST filings, e-Vahan data, and payment transactions. The revision in GDP comes after the new CPI series was released earlier this month. CPI inflation was 2.75% in January, as per the new series with 2024 as the base year, in line with expectations.
"It is difficult to pre-empt how the GDP series will change under the revised framework, given significant changes to coverage, deflation methods, the base year, and input data," Dhiraj Nim, economist at ANZ Banking Group said in a report. Economists at Standard Chartered Bank said their projection for December quarter GDP "could have a wide margin of error, depending on how the new series compares with the old one".
For FY26, economists expect GDP growth to be 7.5%, slightly higher than the government's first advance estimate of 7.4%. With robust growth and low inflation, the RBI's Monetary Policy Committee is expected to keep the repo rate on hold at 5.25% throughout 2026.
The following table details the GDP growth estimates of economists, in ascending order, and their projections for growth in gross value added:
| ORGANISATION | Oct-Dec GDP growth |
Oct-Dec GVA growth |
| Capital Economics | 7.0% | -- |
| Moody's Analytics | 7.2% | -- |
| ICRA | 7.2% | -- |
| Standard Chartered Bank | 7.2% | 7.3% |
| ANZ Banking Group | 7.4% | 7.2% |
| QuantEco Research | 7.4% | 7.6% |
| Nomura | 7.5% | -- |
| BofA Securities India | 7.5% | 8.0% |
| ICICI Bank | 7.6% | 7.9% |
| Nirmal Bang Equities Pvt. Ltd. | 7.8% | 7.9% |
| HDFC Bank | 8.1% | 7.8% |
| State Bank of India | 8.1% | 8.1% |
| Motilal Oswal Financial Services | 8.5% | 8.4% |
| IDFC FIRST Bank | 8.7% | -- |
End
IST, or Indian Standard Time, is five-and-a-half hours ahead of GMT
Edited by Rajeev Pai
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