The government cut its estimate of annual growth for the fiscal year to 4.9 per cent from 5 per cent because of a contraction in the manufacturing and mining sectors. The revision down will do little to help the Congress party-led ruling alliance, which faces an uphill battle in a general election due by May amid allegations of economic mismanagement, corruption scams and high inflation. Last week, the Statistics Ministry revised down economic growth for the previous fiscal year to 4.5 per cent – the slowest pace during the decade Manmohan Singh has been prime minister – from an earlier estimate of 5 per cent. Finance Minister P Chidambaram expressed satisfaction over the growth projections and exuded confidence that it will improve significantly in the next fiscal year (FY15). Last year, the Finance Minister had projected gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 6.1-6.7 per cent in 2013/14 in his annual budget, but lately lowered the estimates to about 5 per cent.

(NDTV)