Governments H1 fiscal deficit stands at 36.5% of full-year goal: CGA knowledge

The Centre’s fiscal deficit stood at 36.5% of the full-year goal on the finish of the primary half of FY26, in accordance with knowledge launched by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA) on Friday (October 31, 2025).

The fiscal deficit was 29% of the Budget Estimates (BE) of 2024-25 within the first six months of the earlier monetary 12 months.

In absolute phrases, the fiscal deficit, or hole between the federal government’s expenditure and income, was ₹5,73,123 crore within the April-September interval of 2025-26.

The Centre estimates the fiscal deficit throughout 2025-26 at 4.4% of the GDP, or ₹15.69 lakh crore.

The authorities has obtained ₹17.3 lakh crore, or 49.5% of the corresponding BE 2025-26 of whole receipts as much as September.

The whole receipts comprised ₹12.29 lakh crore of tax income (web to Centre), ₹4.66 lakh crore of non-tax income and ₹34,770 crore of non-debt capital receipts.

According to the CGA knowledge, over ₹6.31 crore has been transferred to State governments as devolution of share of taxes by the central authorities in the course of the interval, which is ₹86,948 crore greater than the earlier 12 months.

The whole expenditure incurred by the central authorities stood at about ₹23 lakh crore (45.5% of the corresponding BE 2025-26).

Of the entire expenditure, ₹17.22 lakh crore was on income account and ₹5.8 lakh crore on capital account.

Out of the entire income expenditure, ₹5.78 lakh crore was on account of curiosity funds and ₹2.02 lakh crore in direction of main subsidies, the CGA knowledge confirmed.

Aditi Nayar, Chief Economist at Icra, stated a welcome 40% spike in capital expenditure widened the Government of India’s fiscal deficit to ₹5.7 lakh crore or about 37% of the BE in the course of the first half of the fiscal from ₹4.7 lakh crore within the year-ago interval.

“As of now, we expect the typical trend of expenditure savings and higher than budgeted non-tax revenues to be able to absorb any shortfall in tax revenues, and do not foresee a material slippage relative to the Government of India’s FY2026 fiscal deficit target of 4.4% of GDP.”