The gap widens

India’s current account deficit widened to $14.1 billion from $12 billion in the year ago as the gap between imports and exports increased in the quarter ended June, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said on Friday. It remained almost unchanged as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) at 3.1%. The government wants to pull back the deficit to around 2.5% of GDP for the full year from 2.6% in the last fiscal. Economists, however, are sceptical as they expect the robust growth in exports to moderate in the second half of the fiscal as the US and European demand slows on account of global uncertainty.