Centre to soon announce another round of stimulus: Official

<p id="content">The Finance Ministry will soon come up with a fresh round of economic stimulus, Economic Affairs Secretary Tarun Bajaj said yesterday.</p>
Addressing the media here, he said that the Department of Finance has received suggestions and discussions are on the ministry regarding the next set of measures amid the pandemic. It will be announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, he said.

Bajaj's statement comes just over a week after he said that the Centre is open to further measures to boost the economy.

Last month, the Finance Minister had also said that the Centre has not closed the option for another stimulus package.

In May, the government came up with the much-talked-about Rs 20 lakh crore 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' economic package. Both the rounds of stimulus so far have received more flak than appreciation from the industry and experts, as many are of the opinion that they are inadequate, more so in terms of boosting demand.

A recent Moody's report said that that the second round of fiscal stimulus amounts to just 0.2 per cent of the country's real GDP forecast for the financial year 2021 and in total, the two rounds of stimulus bring the government's direct spending on coronavirus-related fiscal support to just around 1.2 per cent of GDP..