Budget Reactions: Economists believe FY13 GDP will be close to 5.5%

Economist and financial experts such as Arvind Mayaram, Economic Affairs Secretary and Raghuram Rajan Chief Economic Advisor believe that Gross Domestic Product in 2012-13 will be close to 5.5%, despite Oct-Dec GDP coming much below market expectations. Q3 gross domestic product  came in at about 4.5 percent as against consensus estimate of 4.8 percent.

"It is Q3 so you still have to wait for Q4. I do believe that we have not been overtly optimistic. On the contrary, if you look at the Budget we have been conservative.These are only advanced estimates - it shall not be as pessimistic as we are seeing it today. It should be close to 5.5 percent," Arvind Mayaram, Economic Affairs Secretary told CNBC TV18.
Raghuram Rajan Chief Economic Advisor believes that Budget has definitely addressed the key concern of growing fiscal gap. "This Budget was really about changing the path we were on, which was expanding fiscal deficits and putting government finances on a solid base-that was the primary aim," he said.