The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) “Handbook of Statistics on Indian States, 2024-25” (10th edition) is a seminal publication that provides a detailed, state-wise statistical portrait of India’s regional economies. Released on December 11, 2025, this edition marks a decade of the Handbook’s evolution since its inception in 2016. The Handbook consolidates sub-national statistics across a broad spectrum of socio-economic dimensions, offering a comprehensive and comparable dataset that is vital for policymakers, researchers, economists, and stakeholders interested in India’s regional economic landscape.
The 10th edition introduces 11 new tables that significantly enhance the Handbook’s coverage and analytical utility. These new tables include state-wise domestic tourist visits, net state value added (NSVA), state-wise status of groundwater extraction, revenue expenditure, capital receipts, market borrowings of state governments, gender-wise subscribers of the National Pension System (NPS) and Atal Pension Yojana (APY), state-wise exports, and state-wise foreign tourist visits. These additions address emerging policy concerns such as water resource management, fiscal sustainability, financial inclusion, and tourism’s economic impact.
The Handbook’s scope is expansive, covering socio-demographics and health, state domestic product (SDP), agriculture and environment, prices and wages, industry and infrastructure, banking and fiscal metrics, social security and pensions, and tourism and exports. The data spans from 1951 to 2024-25, enabling longitudinal analysis of trends, structural shifts, and regional disparities. The Handbook follows a ‘one indicator-one table’ approach, ensuring clarity and ease of use.
Methodologically, the Handbook is prepared by the Regional Economy Monitoring Division (REMD) of the Department of Economic & Policy Research (DEPR), with contributions from various RBI Regional Offices. It relies on multiple data sources, including state government submissions, RBI surveys, and third-party agencies, ensuring reliability and comprehensiveness. The Handbook is available electronically on the RBI’s website, facilitating wide accessibility.
The 10th edition’s new tables and updated data series provide critical insights into India’s post-pandemic economic recovery, fiscal federalism debates, and regional disparities. The Handbook’s detailed, state-level data is indispensable for evidence-based policymaking, regional economic modeling, and investment decisions. It differs from other statistical publications like the Economic Survey of India or NITI Aayog reports by its focused sub-national coverage, historical depth, and specific indicators tailored to regional analysis.
Historical Context and Evolution: RBI’s Handbook Series
The RBI’s “Handbook of Statistics on Indian States” was first published in 2016, providing a comprehensive time series of socio-economic data from 1951 onwards. The Handbook was conceived to address the need for a consolidated, comparable statistical resource on India’s states and Union Territories, facilitating analysis of regional economic trends and disparities.
Over the years, the Handbook has evolved significantly in scope and coverage. The second edition (2016-17) updated existing data series and improved infrastructure coverage. The 2021-22 edition introduced new sections on health and environment, reflecting growing policy priorities. The 2023-24 edition expanded coverage with eight new state-wise tables, including the Gender Parity Index of Gross Enrolment Ratio, Gross State Value Added, and afforestation statistics.
The 10th edition (2024-25) continues this tradition of expansion and refinement, introducing 11 new tables that address contemporary economic and social challenges. The RBI has discontinued some older data series based on outdated base years (e.g., 2004-05 for State Domestic Product) in favor of updated 2011-12 data, ensuring relevance and accuracy.
This evolutionary process underscores the RBI’s commitment to providing a dynamic, policy-relevant statistical resource that reflects India’s changing economic landscape and emerging data needs.
Scope and Coverage
The 10th edition of the Handbook provides a detailed, state-wise statistical portrait across multiple socio-economic dimensions:
1. Socio-demographics and Health: The Handbook includes indicators such as population trends, birth and death rates, infant and maternal mortality ratios, life expectancy, unemployment rates, poverty estimates, and gender parity indices in education. It also covers health infrastructure (doctors, specialists, hospitals, beds) and public expenditure on health. The new table on state-wise domestic tourist visits adds a dimension of economic activity related to tourism.
2. State Domestic Product (SDP): The Handbook presents Net State Value Added (NSVA) at current and constant prices, Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP), and Net State Domestic Product (NSDP). These indicators enable analysis of economic growth disparities, structural transformations (e.g., agriculture to services), and per capita income variations across states. The new NSVA tables provide deeper insights into economic performance.
3. Agriculture and Environment: Agricultural productivity metrics include land use patterns, crop production and yields, irrigation, fertilizer consumption, and livestock production. Environmental indicators cover forest cover, afforestation, tree cover, rainfall, temperature extremes (cold and heat wave days), and expenditure on natural calamity relief. The new table on groundwater extraction is critical for assessing water stress and informing climate resilience and agricultural policies.
4. Prices, Wages, and Inflation: The Handbook tracks state-level Consumer Price Index (CPI) variations, including general inflation, food and beverage inflation, and fuel and light inflation. It also covers rural and urban wage gaps and unemployment rates, aiding in monetary policy regionalization and social protection program design.
5. Industry and Infrastructure: Indicators include industrial output, MSME distribution, power consumption, transport infrastructure, and construction activity. These tables highlight industrial and infrastructural development gaps and opportunities across states.
6. Banking and Fiscal Metrics: The Handbook provides detailed data on state-wise credit deployment (credit-deposit ratios, priority sector lending), fiscal health (revenue expenditure, capital receipts, market borrowings), and debt sustainability. The new tables on market borrowings and capital receipts enable evaluation of state government fiscal discipline and compliance with FRBM targets.
7. Social Security and Pensions: New tables on gender-wise NPS and APY enrolments reveal financial inclusion gaps and the penetration of pension schemes across states, providing valuable data for social security policy analysis.
8. Tourism and Exports: State-wise foreign tourist visits and exports data inform tourism policy, export promotion strategies, and the impact of global shocks on state economies.
Methodology and Data Sources
The Handbook is prepared by the Regional Economy Monitoring Division (REMD) of the Department of Economic & Policy Research (DEPR), with contributions from various RBI Regional Offices. The RBI follows a rigorous, collaborative approach to data collection and compilation, ensuring accuracy and reliability.
The Handbook relies on multiple data sources:
- State Government Submissions: Direct data from states on socio-economic indicators.
- RBI Surveys: Specific surveys conducted by the RBI to capture detailed regional economic data.
- Third-Party Agencies: Specialized agencies providing sector-specific data.
- Other RBI Publications: Data from the Report on State Finances, Financial Stability Reports, and other RBI publications.
The ‘one indicator-one table’ approach ensures clarity and ease of use. The data spans from 1951 to 2024-25, enabling longitudinal analysis. The RBI invites feedback on the Handbook, reflecting an open and collaborative approach to improving data quality and coverage.
Significance and Potential Applications of the 11 New Tables
The 11 new tables introduced in the 2024-25 edition significantly enhance the Handbook’s analytical utility:
| Table Name | Domain | Significance and Applications |
|---|---|---|
| State-wise Domestic Tourist Visits | Tourism | Assesses economic impact of domestic tourism, informs tourism policies, identifies untapped potential. |
| Net State Value Added (NSVA) | State Domestic Product | Provides deeper insights into economic performance, growth disparities, and structural transformations. |
| State-wise Status of Ground Water Extraction | Environment/Agriculture | Critical for water resource management, climate resilience policies, and agricultural sustainability. |
| State-wise Revenue Expenditure | Fiscal Metrics | Evaluates fiscal health, efficiency of government spending, and fiscal discipline. |
| State-wise Capital Receipts | Fiscal Metrics | Assesses investment patterns, fiscal sustainability, and compliance with FRBM targets. |
| Market Borrowings of State Governments | Fiscal Metrics | Evaluates debt sustainability, fiscal discipline, and off-budget borrowing trends. |
| State-wise Gender-wise Subscribers of National Pension System (NPS) All Citizen | Social Security | Reveals financial inclusion gaps, gender disparities in formal savings, and pension scheme penetration. |
| State-wise Gender-wise Enrolments under Atal Pension Yojana (APY) | Social Security | Provides insights into pension scheme reach, gender gaps, and social security policy effectiveness. |
| State-wise Exports | Industry/Trade | Informs export promotion strategies, economic diversification, and global market competitiveness. |
| State-wise Foreign Tourist Visits | Tourism | Assesses economic impact of foreign tourism, informs policy and investment in tourism sector. |
These tables address emerging policy priorities and data gaps, enhancing the Handbook’s relevance for evidence-based policymaking, research, and investment decisions.
Accessibility and Usability
The Handbook is available electronically on the RBI’s official website, ensuring wide accessibility to policymakers, researchers, economists, and the public. The electronic format facilitates easy downloading and navigation.
The Handbook is well-organized with a clear table of contents, enabling users to quickly locate specific data. Each table is clearly labeled and follows the ‘one indicator-one table’ approach, ensuring clarity and ease of interpretation.
The RBI also provides interactive tools and dashboards that integrate multiple state-wise datasets, allowing users to visualize trends, explore state-specific data, and view rankings through heat maps. These tools enhance usability and enable deeper data analysis.
Feedback and Reviews from Experts, Policymakers, and Researchers
The Handbook has been widely praised by experts for its comprehensive coverage and methodological rigor. The ‘one indicator-one table’ approach is appreciated for its simplicity and clarity. Policymakers value the Handbook as an indispensable resource for evidence-based policymaking, enabling targeted interventions to address regional disparities.
Researchers highlight the Handbook’s extensive time series data, which is crucial for regional economic modeling, inequality studies, and fiscal federalism research. The data on demographics, health, state economy, agriculture, environment, prices, wages, industry, infrastructure, banking, and fiscal indicators provides a valuable resource for academic and policy research.
The new tables in the 2024-25 edition have been particularly welcomed for addressing emerging policy concerns such as water resource management, fiscal sustainability, financial inclusion, and tourism’s economic impact.
Policy Implications and Use Cases
The Handbook’s data is instrumental for various stakeholders:
- Policymakers: For resource allocation, targeted schemes (e.g., Aspirational Districts Program), crisis response (e.g., pandemic relief), and evaluating compliance with fiscal targets.
- Researchers and Academics: For regional economic modeling, inequality studies, fiscal federalism research, and policy impact assessment.
- Investors and Businesses: For market entry strategies, supply chain optimization, and risk assessment based on state-level economic and fiscal health.
- Civil Society: For advocacy on social sector spending, environmental sustainability, labor rights, and financial inclusion.
Case studies could include designing state-specific industrial policies based on credit and infrastructure data, addressing agricultural distress in states with high groundwater extraction and low productivity, and promoting tourism or export-led growth in states with untapped potential.
Limitations and Critiques
While the Handbook is a comprehensive and valuable resource, some limitations exist:
- Data Gaps: Omissions in informal economy size, migration patterns, climate vulnerability indices, and district-level data.
- Timeliness: Some tables use data from previous years, which may not be current enough for real-time policymaking.
- Accessibility: The Handbook is free and electronically available but may not be user-friendly for non-experts without additional visualization tools or dashboards.
- Political Economy Considerations: Potential for states to manipulate or delay data submission for political reasons, though the RBI’s rigorous data collection process mitigates this risk.
Recommendations for Improvement
To enhance the Handbook’s utility and relevance, the following improvements could be considered:
- Expand coverage to include new areas such as startup ecosystems, digital infrastructure, gig economy metrics, and ESG scores.
- Improve data granularity with district-level breakdowns and urban-rural splits.
- Enhance interactive access through API integration and customizable dashboards for real-time data exploration.
- Incorporate forward-looking indicators such as state-level AI readiness indices or climate vulnerability scores.
- Provide a glossary of key terms and links to complementary datasets from MOSPI, NITI Aayog, and state governments.
Conclusion
The 10th edition of the RBI’s “Handbook of Statistics on Indian States, 2024-25” is a comprehensive, rigorous, and policy-relevant statistical resource that provides an invaluable portrait of India’s regional economic landscape. The introduction of 11 new tables significantly enhances the Handbook’s coverage and analytical utility, addressing emerging policy concerns and data gaps. The Handbook’s extensive time series data, clear presentation, and electronic accessibility make it an indispensable tool for policymakers, researchers, economists, and stakeholders.
While some limitations exist, the Handbook remains a cornerstone for evidence-based policymaking and regional economic analysis in India. The recommended improvements would further enhance its relevance and usability, ensuring it continues to serve as a vital resource for understanding and addressing India’s regional economic disparities and opportunities.
References: RBI’s Handbook of Statistics on Indian States dated 11 December 2025