India, May 13 -- "The West Asia crisis is not a foreign policy concern that occasionally bleeds into economic planning but a live balance-of-payments stress test with direct consequences for inflation, CAD (current account deficit) and exchange rate," Chief Economic Advisor (CEA) V Anantha Nageswaran said on Tuesday at a CII event. The CEA's comments come days after the Prime Minister appealed to Indians to judiciously use petrol-diesel and stop buying gold and traveling abroad to help the economy mitigate the consequences of the ongoing war in West Asia.

These pages discussed on Tuesday how the IMF expects India's current account deficit to increase for four consecutive years up to 2027-28 and some demand deflation might be absolutely n...