India's external debt crosses $100b: RBI
MUMBAI THE COUNTRY'S external debt rose by 2.1 per cent to $100.25 billion at the end of March 2001 following accretion of $5.5 billion under the State Bank of India's India Millennium Deposits scheme, according to the Reserve Bank of India.
"The overall increase in external debt during the year could be contained at $2.1 billion in view of sluggishness in normal commercial borrowings and valuation factors," the apex bank observed in its annual report, released here on Tuesday.
The total external debt for 1999-00 stood at $98.15 billion, it said. The share of debt from multilateral agencies (except IMF) and bilateral sources in total debt, declined to 47.6 per cent at end-March 2001 from 50.5 per cent in end-March 2000 while that of rupee debt's share also fell to 3.7 per cent from 4.5 per cent over the same period, RBI said.
The apex bank said there has been a consolidation of external debt with robust growth in current receipts, containment of current account deficit, capping of short term debt flows and pre-dominance of equity flows in the capital account.
Moreover, according to the apex bank, the capital flows were used to build up the forex reserves instead of financing current account requirements.
The share of commercial borrowings, including that of long-term trade credit had increased from 27.1 per cent in end March 2000 to 29.9 per cent by March 2001. "This increase is on account of the inflows from IMD," RBI added.
The proportion of long term non-resident deposits grew to 15.4 per cent from 13.8 per cent over the same period.
"The interest payments for NRI deposits showed marginal decline from $1.79 billion in 1999-00 to $1.73 billion in 2000-01," RBI said. RBI said the external debt's sustainability was reflected by its ratio with the country's gross domestic product which declined from 21.9 per cent in end-March 2000 to 21.4 per cent in end-March 2001.
"The ratio of debt to current receipts fell to 126.9 per cent by end March 2001 from 145.5 per cent in the same period previous year," it said adding the proportion of short-term debt also declined to 3.5 per cent from four per cent in the same period.
The RBI said interest service ratio continued its downward trajectory, declined from 7.3 per cent for 1999-00 to 6.4 per cent during 2000-01.
The debt service and liability ratios grew to 17.1 per cent and 18.3 per cent in 2000-01 from 16.2 per cent and 17.0 per cent in 1999-2000, RBI added.
This increase in the debt and liability services was essentially due to prepayment of external asistance and refinancing of commercial debt. (PTI)
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