One number about India's economy, work or money, explained with a chart and traced to its primary source — the ministry's release, the regulator's filing, the survey itself. Built by the CapitalVia research desk.
Net inflow into government small-savings schemes hit ₹1.96 lakh crore in April–August 2026, against ₹1.14 lakh crore a year earlier. That is 74% of the full-year Budget estimate.
New fixed deposits earned 5.67% in August against 4.82% inflation. The 0.85-point cushion was 2.92 points in January, and tax wipes it out from the 15% slab up.
India's 2.67 lakh registered factories employ 2.10 crore people. Each adds ₹12.83 lakh of value a year: ₹5.50 lakh is net profit, ₹3.82 lakh is pay.
India is 38th of 139 in WIPO's Global Innovation Index 2026: 49th on what goes in, 25th on what comes out.
Household financial liabilities hit ₹158.5 lakh crore in March 2026 — 45.9% of GDP, up from 36.4% in 2022. The ratio hasn't fallen in a single quarter since.
India's retail inflation was 4.82% in August 2026. Almost no household actually paid that. It is the midpoint of twelve very different numbers.
EPFO's mandatory PF ceiling rose from ₹15,000 to ₹25,000 on 17 Sep 2026, the first change since 2014. About 51 lakh more employees are pulled in.
RBI's first FY26 estimates: households added 13% more to savings but took 36% more new loans. Gold loans took ₹27 of every ₹100 of new bank personal loans.
Bank credit to industry grew 20.0% in July 2026 and personal loans 16.2%. After more than five years of households leading, industry has been ahead since May 2026.
SIP inflows hit a record ₹32,297 crore in August 2026, but 89 SIPs ended for every 100 started this financial year. The net growth is far thinner than the headline.
Gross GST rose 14.8% in August 2026. Net domestic GST grew just 3.4%, and imports supplied 70% of the rise in net GST.
India made 24.51 bn UPI payments in August 2026. The average was ₹1,217, down 34% from ₹1,843 in 2020. UPI grew by taking over small, everyday payments.
In August 2026 India exported $5.55bn of electronics against $2.92bn of textiles and apparel. A year ago the two were level.
Gold imports fell to $2.30 bn in August from $5.44 bn, the smallest August since 2019. Duty is back at 15%, and a gram of imported gold costs 36% more in rupees.
White-collar hiring grew 14% across India in August 2026. In Mumbai it grew 7%. In Gandhinagar it grew 44%.
India started the year at 2.74%. Eight monthly readings later it is 4.82% — past the RBI’s 4% target and the highest print of the new 2024=100 index series.
India's personal income tax rests on a remarkably narrow base — about 1.4 out of every 100 Indians. Not because of mass evasion, but because of how the population is built.
White-collar hiring grew 14% year on year in August 2026. The fastest-growing group isn't freshers or AI hubs — it's people with 13 to 16 years of experience.
The familiar story is that India grows because Indians spend. In April–June 2026, investment did just as much of the lifting — and it is a much smaller engine.
In April–June 2026, capital investment reached its largest share of India’s economy in the current GDP series — and it is growing far faster than household consumption.
Indian startups closed 7% more funding rounds in January–June 2026 than a year earlier, and raised 9% less money. And one round — CRED’s $900 Mn — was a sixth of it.
RBI's annual survey: software services exports rose 8.2% to $221.4 billion in 2025-26. The only segment that shrank is the one founders talk about most — products.
Between July 2025 and July 2026, rural female labour force participation rose 1.9 percentage points to 38.8%. Over the same twelve months, urban female participation fell 0.5 points, to 25.3%.
April–June 2026 was not a shopping quarter. It was a buying-machines quarter: the economy grew 7.8%, and household spending was not what drove it.
India Inc budgeted an 8.9% raise for 2026. After inflation, the real gain is about 4.3% — and in IT, just 2.4%.