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News Desk

The Statesman

Publication Date : 01-01-2013

At end-September 2012, India’s total external debt stood at US$365.3 billion, recording an increase of about $20.0 billion (5.8 per cent) over the level at end-March 2012.

The rise in external debt is largely due to higher Non-resident Indians (NRI) deposits, short-term debt and commercial borrowings, according to official data released yesterday.

The long-term debt was $280.8 billion at end-September 2012, showing an increase of 5.1 per cent over the end-March 2012 level, while short-term debt increased by 8.1 per cent to $84.5 billion.

Short-term debt accounted for 23.1 per cent of India’s total external debt, while the remaining (76.9 per cent) was long-term debt. Component-wise, the share of commercial borrowings stood highest at 29.8 per cent, followed by NRI deposits (18.3 per cent) and multilateral debt (13.9 per cent).

Government (Sovereign) external debt stood at $81.5 billion, (22.3 per cent of total external debt) at end-September 2012 vis-a-vis $81.9 billion (23.7 per cent) at end-March 2012.

The share of US dollar denominated debt was the highest in India’s external debt stock at 55.7 per cent at end-September 2012, followed by the Indian rupee (22.9 per cent), Japanese yen (8.6 per cent), SDR (8.1 per cent) and Euro (3.2 per cent).

The ratio of concessional debt to total external debt declined to 13.2 per cent at end-September 2012 from 13.9 per cent at end-March 2012.