The growth in e-way bills, or electronic permits, generated by businesses for transporting goods within and across states, slowed down to 14.7 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) in February from 23.1 per cent growth in January, according to data released by the Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) portal.

       Sequentially, the number of e-way bills dipped in February to 111.6 million, after rising for three consecutive months to touch a record 118.1 million in January.

       E-way bills are mandatory for the movement of consignments worth more than Rs 50,000 and are, therefore, an early indicator of demand and supply trends in the economy. This often reflects in macroeconomic indicators with a lag.

       Intra-state e-way bills stood at 72 million in February, while inter-state e-way bills were 39.7 million during the month.

       According to GSTN data, there are 15 million registered GST payers, with 5.8 billion e-way bills generated cumulatively so far.

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       The e-way bill performance tallies with the HSBC India manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI), which plummeted to a 14-month low of 56.3 in February, after a strong start in January at 57.7. However, PMI services rose in February to 59 from a 26-month low of 56.5 in January, due to improving domestic and international demand.

       Growth in India’s dominant services sector got a boost in February from improving domestic and international demand, as new orders placed with Indian companies rose at a faster rate, showed a private business survey released on Wednesday.

       According to data from the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (Fada), February witnessed a broad-based downturn across all categories as the auto market closed with a 7 per cent Y-o-Y decline.

       The Reserve Bank of India has projected the Indian economy to grow at 6.8 per cent in the March quarter of FY25, recovering from a seven-quarter low of 5.6 per cent in the preceding September quarter. The statistics ministry implicitly assumed the economy to grow at 7.6 per cent in the March quarter.

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