India's historic win in Australia gets mention in Economic Survey 2020-21; recovery hailed

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday presented the Economic Survey that details the state of the economy ahead of the government's Budget for the fiscal year beginning April 1, 2021. In the preface of the survey, Chief Economic Adviser Krishnamurthy V. Subramanian states that the Economic Survey 2020-21 is an ardent tribute to the immortal human spirit of grit and compassion encapsulated by the tireless battle against the pandemic by our frontline COVID-19 warriors.

In the midst of the most unfathomable global health emergency experienced in modern history, the resolve of each Indian helped find its way from the darkness of ‘lives vs livelihoods to the glow of ‘#SavingLives&Livelihoods’. The foresight of our collective vision to battle this pandemic became evident when policy insights and implementation at the Centre, State and local level converged to initiate a V-shaped economic recovery," KV Subramanian said.

India's triumph against Australia mentioned in Economic Survey 20-21

The Chief Economic Adviser said that this spirit resonated in Team India’s recent victory in Australia where their resilience to rebound from 36 all out to win the Test series was a V-shaped performance indeed! India ended their tour Down Under on a high. The team defeated Australia 2-1 in its own den to clinch the Border-Gavaskar trophy for the second time in a row.

The survey states that "Similarly, after experiencing a sharp contraction of 23.9% in the first quarter of 2020-21, India is expected to be the fastest-growing economy in the next two years. Projections by various national and international agencies including the IMF project this resilience of the Indian economy. Through this year, as India bravely fought the global pandemic, it charted its own unique trajectory – showing remarkable resilience, be it fighting the virus or ensuring economic recovery."

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This resilience is driven by the strength of our systems that enforced the graded public health measures, ramped up the health response, ensured free food grains to 80 crore people and gave momentum to the economic recovery. India derived its strength from the support of 137 crore Indians who practised social distancing, wore masks and industriously contributed to the fight," it added. 

The Survey makes the case for continued focus on economic growth as the most important objective for India at its stage of development. The survey, then, delineates the constituents that would strengthen the effectiveness of policymaking – continued reforms, innovation, timely regulatory support and withdrawal of forbearance. Continuing the endeavours of previous Surveys to relate economics to a common person, this year the Survey constructs an index of ‘the bare necessities’ across States in India.

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READ | Annual Economic Survey 2020-2021 accessed before Union Budget 2021; Read & Download here