Despite slight slowdown, India still powers on

"Slowdown: Economy to grow at 8.7%"- THE TIMES OF INDIA

"Success in business requires training and discipline and hard work. But if you're not frightened by these things, the opportunities are just as great today as they ever were"- David Rockefeller

Just when you were getting used to 9% growth, the government's statistics office on Thursday said GDP would rise by 8.7% in the current financial year, compared with 9.6% last year and 9.4% in 2005-06.

No worries! Compared to US, which is going into a recession, we are going great guns. And at such oil prices!

While Reserve Bank of India's interest rate hike to keep inflation under check is expected to see the manufacturing sector grow by 9.4% in 2007-08, compared with 12% last year, construction activity is also likely to slow down. But the blame mainly fell on the usual suspect — agriculture — with farm output projected to rise by 2.6% this year, as against 3.8% in 2006-07.

Don't blame the agriculture sector, blame the rains. Also blame the government for not providing irrigation even after 60 years.

The Central Statistical Organisation's estimates, however, have already been questioned, with finance minister P Chidambaram saying the agriculture ministry, which released crop output estimates on Thursday, "not sharing the assessment that agriculture growth will be only 2.6%".

Stop hair-splitting. The fact is, we are going full blast ahead. With a China type authoritarian rule the rate would have probably been double! But no worries, we all love India for its vibrant democracy.