New Delhi: The Centre’s fiscal deficit at the end of November stood at Rs 9.76 lakh crore, or 62.3 per cent of the annual budget target for 2025-26, compared to 52.5 per cent in the year-ago period, government data released on Wednesday showed.
The Centre estimates the fiscal deficit (the gap between expenditure and revenue) during 2025-26 at 4.4 per cent of GDP, or Rs 15.69 lakh crore.
According to data released by the Controller and Auditor General of India (CAG), the central government received about Rs 19.49 lakh crore, or 55.7 per cent of the corresponding budget estimate for total receipts up to November 2025.
This included Rs 13,93,946 crore in net tax revenue to the Centre, Rs 5,16,366 crore in non-tax revenue and Rs 38,927 crore in non-debt capital receipts.
The data also showed that Rs 9,36,561 crore was transferred to state governments as devolution of the Centre’s share of taxes during the period, marking an increase of Rs 1,24,498 crore compared with the year-ago period.
Total expenditure incurred by the Centre till November amounted to Rs 29.26 lakh crore, or 57.8% of the budget estimate for 2025-26. Of this, revenue expenditure stood at Rs 22,67,700 crore, while capital expenditure was Rs 6,58,210 crore.
Out of the total revenue expenditure, interest payments accounted for Rs 7,45,765 crore, while major subsidies amounted to Rs 2,88,333 crore.
Commenting on the data, Aditi Nayar, chief economist at Icra, said the rating agency expects a shortfall of Rs 1.5 lakh crore in the Centre’s gross tax revenues in the current fiscal compared with the FY2025-26 budget estimate, PTI quoted.
“Overall, we expect the potential miss on the taxes side to be offset by higher-than-budgeted non-tax revenues and sizeable expenditure savings on the revenue spending front. As a result, we do not anticipate fiscal slippage at the current juncture,” Nayar said.
