India’s oldest and largest independent think tank, National Council of Applied Economic Research’s (NCAER’s) Business Confidence Index (BCI) registered a substantial increase of 9.1 percent in October-December of 2017, over July-September quarter, as overall sentiment regarding production, domestic sales, exports, imports of raw materials, and pre-tax profits remained buoyant.
NCAER has pointed out that these improved sentiment were broad-based with all the sectors showing rising trends for all these components between the two periods. Besides, it observed that there was a considerable improvement in the situation pertaining to labour employment and wages over the last three months, and expectations about future labour employment and wages were optimistic.
The survey stated that Business Confidence Index fell 12.9 percent in the July-September, as the economy was still adjusting to the implementation of goods and services tax (GST), affecting business sentiment. NCAER is one of the India's oldest economic think tanks, set up in 1956 at the behest of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, to inform policy choices for both public and private sectors.