Govt junks NSO survey pointing to decline in spending

After the employment data row, the Centre Friday withheld yet another survey on consumer expenditure by National Statistical office (NSO) for 2017-18, saying there were “data quality issues”.

Hours after a leaked NSO survey suggested that the average amount of money spent by a person in a month fell by 3.7% to Rs 1,446 in 2017-18 from Rs 1,501 in 2011-12, the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementations decided not to release the Consumer Expenditure Survey

In a statement released late Friday, the ministry said it was examining the feasibility of conducting the next Consumer Expenditure Survey in 2020-2021 and 2021-22 after “incorporating all data quality refinements in the survey process”.

“The ministry has seen the media reports regarding consumer expenditure survey by the NSS stating that consumer spending is falling and the report has been withheld due to its ‘adverse’ findings.

“We would like to emphatically state that there is a rigorous procedure for vetting of data and reports which are produced through surveys. All such submissions which come to the Ministry are draft in nature and cannot be deemed to be the final report,” the statement said.

According to sources in the ministry, the results of the survey were examined and it was noted that there was a significant increase in the divergence at not only the levels in the consumption pattern but also the direction of the change when compared to the other administrative data sources like the actual production of goods and services.

Concerns were also raised about the ability/sensitivity of the survey instrument to capture the consumption of social services by households, especially on health and education.

Earlier this year, the government had withheld from releasing the National Sample Survey Office’s (NSSO) job survey for 2017-18, which had shown a spike in the unemployment rate to over 6%, a 45-year high.

Six months after the pressure mounted on the government, it released the official data, which confirmed that unemployment in the country was nearly five-decade high.