NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s slowest growth in a decade could be worse than anticipated, as preliminary data released on Thursday showed the economy set to have grown 5 percent in fiscal year ending next month, underscoring the urgent need for reforms to boost growth.

The RBI’s forecast for 2012/13 had been 5.5 percent growth, while Finance Minister P. Chidambaram had projected growth of 5.7 percent, down from 6.2 percent in 2011/12, but both appear to have been over-optimisic.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s finance minister is putting welfare, defence and road projects on the chopping block in a last-ditch attempt to hit a tough fiscal deficit target by March, risking short-term economic growth and angering cabinet colleagues.

The cuts will reduce spending by about 1.1 trillion Indian rupees ($20.6 billion) in the current financial year, some 8 percent of budgeted outlay, or roughly 1 percent of estimated gross domestic product, two senior finance ministry officials and a senior government adviser told Reuters.

NEW DELHI, Jan 31 (Reuters) – India’s finance minister is
putting welfare, defence and road projects on the chopping block
in a last-ditch attempt to hit a tough fiscal deficit target by
March, risking short-term economic growth and angering cabinet
colleagues.

The cuts will reduce spending by about 1.1 trillion Indian
rupees ($20.6 billion) in the current financial year, some 8
percent of budgeted outlay, or roughly 1 percent of estimated
gross domestic product, two senior finance ministry officials
and a senior government adviser told Reuters.

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI (Reuters) – India aims to include the bulk price of diesel fuel in its calculation of wholesale price inflation as early as February, two government officials with direct knowledge of the matter said, in a change that is seen adding to upward pressure on the headline inflation rate after New Delhi’s move last week to deregulate prices.

However, the timing of the inclusion of bulk diesel prices in the wholesale price index (WPI), is still uncertain, they said, as it depended how quickly oil companies made their new price data available.

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI, Jan 23 (Reuters) – India aims to include
the bulk price of diesel fuel in its calculation of wholesale
price inflation as early as February, two government officials
with direct knowledge of the matter said, in a change that is
seen adding to upward pressure on the headline inflation rate
after New Delhi’s move last week to deregulate prices.

However, the timing of the inclusion of bulk diesel prices
in the wholesale price index (WPI), is still
uncertain, they said, as it depended how quickly oil companies
made their new price data available.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s government told fuel retailers to raise the price of subsidised diesel in small amounts every month starting Friday in an attempt to prop up public finances without causing a popular backlash before elections.

Fuel subsidies are a drain on India’s finances and the government is struggling to bring the deficit within a target of 5.3 percent of gross domestic product for the financial year ending March. India is the world’s fourth biggest oil importer.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – The government on Thursday allowed state-run fuel retailers to raise prices of heavily subsidised diesel, distancing itself from an unpopular policy ahead of general elections while trying to revive an economy growing at its slowest pace in a decade.

Fuel subsidies are a major drain on India’s budget, which is already running a deficit that the government is struggling to bring within a target of 5.3 percent of GDP for the financial year ending March.

NEW DELHI, Jan 17 (Reuters) – India’s government on Thursday
allowed state-run fuel retailers to raise prices of heavily
subsidised diesel, distancing itself from an unpopular policy
ahead of general elections while trying to revive an economy
growing at its slowest pace in a decade.

Fuel subsidies are a major drain on India’s budget, which is
already running a deficit that the government is struggling to
bring within a target of 5.3 percent of GDP for the financial
year ending March.

NEW DELHI, Jan 17 (Reuters) – India has slapped a 2.5
percent import duty on crude edible oils, the government said on
Thursday, in a move aimed at stemming imports by the world’s top
vegetable oil buyer and protecting domestic oilseeds growers.

India’s farmers had been calling for action against cheap
palm oil imports after Malaysia, the world’s No. 2 palm oil
producer, removed its export duty on the crude variant from Jan.
1.

BADSHAHPUR, India/NEW DELHI (Reuters) – On the evening of December 26, as a government-chartered jet was heading to Singapore with a critically injured New Delhi gang rape victim on board, the teenage survivor of another gang rape was taking her own life.

After writing a suicide note on a page torn from a notebook that named her alleged attackers and accused them of destroying her life, the 17-year-old schoolgirl drank pesticide typically used on the wheat fields surrounding her village in Punjab.