MPPSC 2026 Prelims Paper-I · Question 89 of 100

Correct — C, 5.0 percent. The Economic Survey 2024-25, tabled in Parliament on 31 January 2025, records that India's agriculture sector grew at an average of about 5 per cent a year between FY17 and FY23. The finding was headlined by the Press Information Bureau as 'India's agriculture sector demonstrates resilience, average growth rate of 5 per cent during FY17 to FY23' — the question reproduces that sentence almost word for word, including the word 'resilience'. The Survey attributes the run to productivity gains, crop diversification and the expansion of allied activities, and notes that the sector grew 3.5 per cent in the second quarter of FY25.

• (a)4.2 percent — This is the previous Survey's number, not this one. The Economic Survey 2023-24 reported an average annual agriculture growth of 4.18 per cent over the preceding five years — a different Survey, a different period and a different figure. Carrying last year's statistic into this year's question is the single most common way to lose this mark.
• (b)4.8 percent — A filler value that sits between the two figures students actually remember (4.18 and 5.0). It is not a growth rate the Survey reports for the FY17-FY23 period.
• (d)5.2 percent — Close to a real Survey figure but for a different variable — the Economic Survey 2024-25 puts the growth of agricultural incomes at about 5.23 per cent a year over the past decade. Income growth and sectoral growth are separate series; the FY17-FY23 sector average is 5 per cent.

The Economic Survey is the Ministry of Finance's annual review of the economy, prepared by the Department of Economic Affairs under the Chief Economic Adviser, and tabled a day before the Union Budget. Its agriculture chapter tracks the growth of gross value added in agriculture and allied activities at constant prices. A multi-year average, such as the 5 per cent for FY17-FY23, smooths out the sharp year-to-year swings that a monsoon-dependent sector produces — a point the Survey makes explicitly when it calls the sector 'resilient'. Growth in these years came less from foodgrains than from allied activities, horticulture and diversification.

Questions of the form 'according to Economic Survey X, the figure is Y' need the number pinned to two things: the correct Survey edition and the correct period. The number wanders otherwise — 4.18 per cent (five-year average, Survey 2023-24), 1.4 per cent (the 2023-24 provisional growth rate, hit by a delayed and poor monsoon under El Nino), 5 per cent (FY17-FY23 average, Survey 2024-25) and 3.5 per cent (Q2 of FY25) all belong to the same subject area but to different rows.

• Economic Survey 2024-25 (tabled 31 January 2025): agriculture grew at an average of about 5 per cent a year from FY17 to FY23
• The same Survey records agriculture growth of 3.5 per cent in Q2 of FY 2024-25
• The Survey puts the annual growth of agricultural incomes at about 5.23 per cent over the past decade
• Economic Survey 2023-24 had reported an average annual agriculture growth of 4.18 per cent over the previous five years, with 2023-24 itself at 1.4 per cent
• The Economic Survey is prepared by the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, and presented a day before the Union Budget

• Mixing up Survey editions — 4.18 per cent belongs to the Economic Survey 2023-24, 5 per cent to the 2024-25 Survey
• Confusing the growth of agricultural incomes with the growth of the agriculture sector
• Reading a multi-year average as a single-year growth rate — agriculture grew only 1.4 per cent in 2023-24

MPPSC lifts one headline number per Survey and offers three near-miss figures around it; UPSC rarely asks the number, preferring the institution (who publishes the Survey) or the reasoning (why farm growth is volatile, what drives it).

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Economic Survey of India is prepared by:

  • (a)The Reserve Bank of India
  • (b)The Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance
  • (c)NITI Aayog
  • (d)The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation

  Answer(b) The Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance — under the Chief Economic Adviser.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Economic Survey is normally presented in Parliament:

  • (a)A day before the Union Budget
  • (b)On the last day of the Budget session
  • (c)Along with the Finance Bill
  • (d)At the start of the Monsoon session

  Answer(a) A day before the Union Budget — it sets the analytical background for the Budget.