TNI Bureau: India’s economic growth rate slowed to 5.3 per cent in the fourth quarter of current fiscal year 2011-12. The sharp decline is the lowest quarterly growth rate recorded in three years.

The growth declined as agriculture, manufacturing, mining and construction shrunk in the past few days. Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said that the GDP slipped due to the poor performance of manufacturing sector.

According to the data released by the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO), the growth rate was expected at 6.5 per cent in 2011-12. This is the lowest growth rate since 2002-03 when the GDP stood at 4%.

The data showed that the manufacturing output slipped to 2.5 per cent, from 7.6 per cent in previous fiscal, agriculture sector grew 1.7 per cent against growth of 7.5 per cent in January-March quarter of 2010-11, while mining grew 4.3 per cent (0.6 per cent), manufacturing at 0.3 per cent (growth of 7.3 per cent), construction grew 4.8 per cent (8.9 per cent), and electricity slowed down by 4.9 per cent (5.1 per cent).