Central Figures on Economy Unreliable: Yashwant Sinha

Panaji, May 9 (PTI)Former finance minister Yashwant Sinha today said the data on economic growth put out by the Central government cannot be trusted.

He also questionned the government's claims about GDP growth and generation of employment.

"We cannot trust the figures put out by the Central government. Indian economy itself is a challenge for our democracy..This is a huge crisis of confidence," Sinha said while addressing a group of intellectuals, Citizens for Democracy, on the topic 'Indian economy and challenges before democracy'.

"Sometimes in early 2015 when the present government took over, they changed two things: formula for calculating GDP and base years. The base years are changed from time to time, but both (changing of the GDP and the base year) happened simultenously.

"In 2013-14, which was the last year of the UPA, the growth rate was 4.7 per cent. After application of the new formula, the same growth rate in 2014-15 went up to 6.5 per cent," he said.

"For the fiscal2014-15 and subsequently we do not have comparative figures of growth according to the new and old formulas. At least for five years, the government should have released both the figures so that people could have understood the difference between earlier and present figures," he said.

On the government's claim of employment generation, Sinha said the Centre has been playing with the figures to show that jobs are created in large numbers.

"Everyone was speaking about employment generation. So, the government decided to ask some sarakari economists to write long learned articles and in these articles they said that the real figure is the employees provident fund organization (EPFO) figures," Sinha claimed.

He said there is a group of eminent economists which says the EPFO figures are not the real figures.

"The employment generation figures collected by the Union government's Labour Bureau were disappointing. What the government doing now is that they have told the labour bureau that don't collect the figures on employment generation," Sinha claimed.

Sinha, who has severed ties with the BJP, said, "the growth rate and employment are the two areas where we have not been told the truth and we don't know what is the real situation".

Sinha, who had launched 'Rashtra Manch to run a movement against the policies of the Central government, termed as "serious" the "prevailing agrarian distress" in the country.

"In all, 110 farmers organisations have come together to launch a 'Village bandh' and from June 1-10, the farmers are not going to send their produce to the cities.

"So you are not going to get your supply of fruits, vegetables, milk, and grains. Farmers have also decided not to visit the cities. So it would be a complete divide between villages and cities," he said.

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