Excerpts from CNBC-TV18’s exclusive interview with Manoj Pradhan:

Q: 8.8% GDP growth, not bad?

A: Absolutely. Our team in India led by Chetan Ahya was expecting something slightly lower than that. This is an absolutely fantastic number for the Indian economy. What this does suggest though is that the markets will probably no doubt already be repricing and wondering what the RBIs next move will be. So far we have seen growth at the crossroads. This is a phase where India’s growth may slip slightly lower. That looks like a call that is destined to wait just a little bit longer.

There is no doubt that there are headwinds to the Indian growth. I think it is going to come down just a little bit, probably during the second half of this year. This number no doubt certainly adds caution to that call. Overall that growth may not come down in line with our India team’s call.

Q: Interesting you spoke about the RBI stance now. What do you think might put more pressure on them to tighten the policy going forward, now that growth is not slowing down alarmingly?

A: If this is a beginning of the trend of a stronger than expected growth, then this is completely different scenario. Globally, this story is very interesting. If you look at the RBI's real interest rate, it is nearly at zero. This suggests that as far as the RBI connection to the growth story is concerned, they really haven’t put any kind of emphasis on inflation.

This is primarily because they have been worried about what is going to happen post their hikes they had made just a few years ago and what that is going to do to the growth story. If the growth story remains consistently strong,  that would give them considerable room to stretch their arms and raise the interest rates a bit. Whether that actually happens is more a math for India specialists.