In an unprecedented correction of data, the government, on Thursday, revised the IIP (Index of Industrial Production) growth figure upwards twice during the day, first to 2.2 per cent, and later to 2.3 per cent for April from the two per cent expansion announced in a press release on Wednesday.
Wrong recording of data
In its first corrigendum to the quick estimates of IIP for April, the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation said: “Due to wrong recording of production data for the electricity sector, the Index of Industrial Production for the electricity sector for April is corrected to 159.1 from 153.8 as shown in the press release dated June 12, 2013, of this Ministry”.
Accordingly, the Ministry revised the electricity sector growth rate to 3.4 per cent for April from the paltry 0.7 per cent stated in the release on June 12 and, as a result, the general index for the month stood revised upward to 167.8 from 167.3 as stated in Wednesday’s release.
Taking into account the upward data correction, “the revised index is 2.2 per cent higher as compared to the level in the month of April 2012,” the corrigendum said.
Corrigendum
However, within a span of a few hours, the Ministry issued a revised corrigendum as the IIP for the electricity sector at 159.1 worked out to a higher growth of 4.2 per cent instead of 3.4 per cent stated earlier during the day.
As a consequence, the overall industrial growth figure stood revised a second time to 2.3 per cent, a tad higher than the 2.2 per cent stated earlier in the day.