Why carry out unnecessary surveys?

For the first time the government has carried out a survey of the economy in mid-year. The first one was carried out before the budget in January, so it is about middle of the calendar year, but our financial year starts on 1 April so mid-year should have been in October. Why this hurry in releasing a second volume? The survey warns of the dangers of sustained deflation. What does it mean? Does it mean a contraction in the supply of money or does it mean a fall in prices of goods and services? The survey talks of structural fall in inflation due to persistently low commodity prices, especially oil and, predictably, calls for interest rate to be lowered by 100 basis points. Retail inflation is low because of lower food prices, even though consumption remains at previous levels. The fall in food inflation is partly due to increased production, due to a good monsoon and, partly due to lower Minimum Support Price, or MSP, at which the government buys agricultural items. The real economy grew by 7.1% in 2016-17 despite the sudden shock of demonetization, when the government withdrew all Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 notes from the circulation. "This growth suggested that the economy was relatively resilient to the large liquidity shock of demonetisation which reduced cash in circulation by 22.6% in the second half of 2016-17," the Survey said. "The apparent resilience was even more marked in nominal growth magnitudes because both nominal GVA and GDP growth accelerated by over 1 percentage point in 2016-17 compared with 2015-16." However, it said that growth will not be as expected this year. Why? Because of twin balance sheet problems, which means companies defaulting on debts and banks with large bad loans on their books, farmers' loan waivers, and increase in fiscal deficit of states. Reducing MSP and then spending Rs 3 trillion in loan waivers to farmers has merely transferred deficit from the center to the states and so they have curtailed spending. What the survey shows is that the informal sector was badly hit by demonetization but it is recovering and cash in circulation is still not back to normal, but nominal GDP is rising. Perhaps, the key to increasing GDP growth is to bring supply of currency back to the levels it was before demonetization. To increase growth, manufacturing has to increase from its dismal level of 16.2% of GDP to 25-30% of GDP. Hourly, rate of wages in manufacturing has actually fallen. Level of capacity utilisation of Indian companies is between 70-72% and they will start expanding only when it goes up above 80%. Indian companies are unable to compete with imports of Chinese goods because the rupee is so strong. If the rupee falls inflation will rise. But then, interest rate might rise as well. Like going round in circles. What is the point of surveys?