New Delhi, Sept. 19 -- India's economy is holding up strongly despite fiscal consolidation, slowing credit growth and trade frictions with the US, said Neelkanth Mishra, chief economist at Axis Bank and a member of the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council.

The Centre has reduced its fiscal deficit substantially over the past few years-by 80 basis points (bps) in FY24, 80 bps in FY25, and another 40 bps in the current year's budget, said Mishra, who is also head of global research at Axis Capital.

On the monetary side, however, credit growth slowed sharply from 16.3% in March 2024 to about 9.8% in May 2025, Mishra said in an interview. "Given that bank credit equals about 56% of GDP, this slowdown shaved off around 2-3 percentage p...