New Delhi: Finance Minister Piyush Goyal state  the fiscal deficit for the current financial year (FY2018-19) at 3.4% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as against the earlier target of 3.3%. It need to be noted that  there has been a shortfall in GST collection. Most of the experts had already predicted that the government could miss the fiscal deficit target on account of a shortfall in GST collection. Average GST collection per month stood at Rs 96,800 crore as against the budget estimate of Rs 1.08 lakh crore per month.

Mr. Goyal said the current account deficit for FY19 is seen at 2.5% of GDP. The Finance Minister said India has enjoyed the best phase of macro-economic stability and the country was recognised as a bright spot in the last 5 years.  The government is not going to meet its target for the fiscal deficit, the difference between all its earnings and expenditure in 2018-19

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However SBI and HSBC had expected the government to meet its fiscal deficit target of 3.3 percent of the GDP while Axis Bank and Kotak had said that the metric was likely to slip by 20 basis points. The government had budgeted fiscal deficit of Rs 6.24 lakh crore, or 3.3 per cent of the GDP, for FY19. Fiscal deficit for April-November stood at Rs 7.16 lakh crore, or 114.8 per cent of the target. It is slightly more than the 112 per cent recorded in the same period last fiscal.

While The government had missed the target last year, ending at 3.5% of GDP against budgeted 3.2% of GDP.  Fears of a fiscal slippage had intensified following the sharp 23.5% YoY rise in the fiscal defict in April-October FY2019, which crossed the budget estimate for the full year despite the relief offered by the recent correction in crude oil prices

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