New Delhi [India], September 3 : Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal slammed the former Finance Secretary Subhash Chandra Garg and former RBI governor Raghuram Rajan after both expressed doubts over the latest GDP numbers announced by the government, calling them "jobless" people who want to mislead the public over the data. 
Addressing the Automotive Component Manufacturers Association Programme at Taj Palace in Delhi, the Commerce Minister said that attempts are being made to mislead the people of India by comparing a growth rate from the old series with one from the new series. 
"I see some of the opposition leaders on television, perhaps you can even include a former Finance Secretary or a former Reserve Bank Governor among them, both of whom could not complete their terms in government, and for the right reasons. Many of you, if you look back, will remember all that the country was going through during the 2012–14 period. They don't even know how to compare apples with apples. They are trying to mislead the people of India by comparing a growth rate from the old series with one from the new series, where the base year itself has changed,” he said at the event. 
Later, while speaking to reporters, Commerce Minister Goyal said, "A few jobless people call themselves economists and appear on TV channels to harm the country. Do not fall for this." 
Asserting that "truth cannot be hidden", Goyal said that Ministers in the government do not manufacture GDP data.
"When you have such a negative mindset, in a way, you are diminishing yourself. When you attempt to demotivate people by distorting the truth, you betray the people. Record growth of 7.8% is something that no other country has been able to replicate," he said. 
India's real GDP grew by 7.8% in the first quarter of the fiscal year 2026-27, according to official data released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI)
SC Garg, who was a secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs, Govt of India and later went on to become Finance Secretary under the Modi government, has called out government data and claimed that the GDP growth in Q1 2026-27 in current prices is 2.6% and in real terms close to 0. 
"There are still messier distortions in sectoral performance, with manufacturing and consumption witnessing negative growth," he wrote on X. 
Former NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant also weighed in on the debate, saying that it is not appropriate to compare GDP data across various series. 
"Since the GDP rebasing, GDP data for Q1 (June quarter) FY26 has been estimated at 75L crores (or 80 trillion), vs. 81 lakh crores (Rs. 81T). This gives us a real growth rate of ~ 7.8 % . It would be incorrect to compare the GDP number generated by the 2011-12 series with that of the 2022-23 series. This would be comparing Apples to Oranges," he said. 
"⁠This needless controversy is reminiscent of 2015, when the 2011-12 series was released, and growth estimates were questioned. The fact remains that base-year changes are necessary to capture the economy’s updated structure and dynamics. Since 2015, digital payments, GST, and digitisation have emerged, producing much more data and providing a far more comprehensive picture of the economy," he added.