Page 448 - ES 2020-21_Volume-1-2 [28-01-21]

Fiscal Developments 75

Central Government Debt
2.40 Total liabilities of the Central Government include debt contracted against the Consolidated
Fund of India, technically defined as Public Debt, as well as liabilities in the Public Account.
These liabilities include external debt (end-of-the financial year) at current exchange rate
but exclude part of NSSF liabilities to the extent of States’ borrowings from the NSSF and
investments in public agencies out of the NSSF, which do not finance Central Government
deficit. Total liabilities of the Central Government at end March 2020 stood at ` 97.05 lakh
crore (refer to Table 11). Out of these, 88.67 per cent was public debt and the remaining 10 per
cent catered to Public Account liabilities, which include National Small Savings Fund, State
Provident Funds, Reserve Funds and Deposits and other Accounts.

Table 11: Debt Position of the Central Government (in ` Lakh crore)

2014-15 2015-16 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 2019-20 P
A. Public Debt (A1+A2) 51.05 57.11 61.50 68.84 75.88 86.05
A1. Internal Debt (a+b) 47.38 53.05 57.42 64.01 70.75 80.20

a. Marketable Securities 43.09 47.28 50.49 55.10 59.69 65.60
b. Non-marketable Securities 4.29 5.77 6.93 8.91 11.06 14.60

A2. External Debt* 3.66 4.07 4.08 4.83 5.13 5.85
B. Public Account - Other 7.62 8.16 8.57 9.15 9.96 9.89
Liabilities
C. Extra-Budgetary Resources 0.00 0.00 0.09 0.24 0.88 1.10
D. Total Liabilities (A+B+C) 58.66 65.27 70.16 78.23 86.72 97.05

Source: Various issues of Status Paper on Government Debt and Quarterly Report on Public Debt; P: Provisional

2.41 Figure 14 shows that total liabilities of the Central Government, as a ratio of GDP, declined
steadily immediately after the enactment of the FRBM Act, 2003, and has sustained at a level
during the last decade.

Figure 14: Trend in Centre’s Debt-GDP ratio

60
58
56
54
Per cent of GDP 50
52

48
46
44
42
40

Source: Various issues of Status Paper on Government Debt; PA:Provisional