Economic Survey 2026: CEA Nageswaran warns the old world order is gone, India’s growth playbook is next

Before Economic Survey’s tabling in Parliament, Chief Economic Adviser V. Anantha Nageswaran argues India must rethink growth, jobs and indigenisation as geopolitics upends the old world order.

• India's Economic Survey 2025–26 to be tabled in Parliament on January 29
• India's GDP grows 7.4%, shows fiscal discipline despite global risks.
• Focus on indigenisation, job creation, and resilience against external shocks

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A day before the government tables the Economic Survey in Parliament, India’s Chief Economic Adviser V. Anantha Nageswaran has laid out the intellectual and economic framework behind the document, arguing that India is navigating an unprecedented global moment marked by geopolitical disruption, currency volatility and structural uncertainty.

In a column published in Mint on Thursday, Nageswaran said the Survey comes at a time when the global order that countries were once comfortable with is 'no longer relevant,' even as there is little agreement on what might replace it or how the transition will unfold.

Against that unsettled backdrop, the Economic Survey seeks to assess whether India’s growth strategy is robust enough to sustain momentum while absorbing external shocks.

According to the column, India is closing FY26 with real GDP growth estimated at 7.4 percent, maintaining macroeconomic stability even as the Union government has sharply reduced its fiscal deficit as a share of GDP since the pandemic years. The consolidation, Nageswaran wrote, has coincided with a rise in the quality of public spending, particularly through higher infrastructure investment.

This combination of growth and fiscal discipline helped India secure three credit rating upgrades last year, strengthening expectations of a longer phase of non-inflationary growth, something the economy has struggled to achieve consistently in past cycles. A healthy banking system and active capital markets, especially for startups, have added resilience, the column noted.

Still, global risks remain acute. Since the start of 2025, the rupee has weakened more than 6 percent against the US dollar. While some emerging-market currencies have fared better in the short run, Nageswaran pointed out that over a longer six-year window since early 2020, most major emerging-market currencies, including the rupee, have depreciated by a similar magnitude.

The vulnerability, he argued, lies in current account deficits. In periods of geopolitical stress, cross-border capital flows react sharply to political signals, making money 'no longer neutral.'

The column contrasts India’s position with countries that built export-led manufacturing bases and ran external surpluses in the post-Bretton Woods era, enjoying stable currencies. That path, Nageswaran cautioned, is harder today due to climate constraints, energy-transition pressures and intense competition from China, which posted a trade surplus exceeding $1 trillion in 2025.

These realities, he said, have injected urgency into indigenisation and supply-chain resilience, even as rapid advances in artificial intelligence raise fresh questions about employment for a country that needs to generate at least 8 million jobs annually.

The Economic Survey, Nageswaran wrote, grapples with whether India has done enough to lift and sustain its growth rate, how it can pursue indigenisation without hurting export competitiveness, and how to structurally reduce the cost of capital, an issue central to long-term investment.

Beyond policy, the column argues that development cannot rest on the state alone. Drawing lessons from wealthier economies, Nageswaran stressed the role of corporate leadership and citizen behaviour in shaping growth outcomes, from attitudes to public goods and data consumption to expectations of fiscal support.

The Survey, he said, aims not just to diagnose the economy but to stimulate public debate on the choices facing both policymakers and citizens. Given the breadth of issues, the 2025–26 edition is longer and structured differently from previous years.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is expected to table the Economic Survey for 2025–26 in both Houses of Parliament of India between 11 am and 12 pm on January 29, ahead of the Union Budget. The tabling will be followed by a press conference addressed by Nageswaran, where the government is likely to elaborate on the themes outlined in the Survey.