'India's growth to bounce back to 7.4% in 2017-18'

"Government de-regulation and reform of taxes on goods and services, among other areas, should improve confidence and thus business investment and growth prospects," ADB's flagship economic publication Asian Development Outlook 2017 noted.

"Growth is expected to edge up to 7.4 per cent in 2017 and 7.6 per cent in 2018," it said.

INDIA will see growth re-accelerate despite drag caused by excessive corporate investment in the past and bank lending currently constrained by a heavy load of stressed assets, it said.

According to the earlier estimates released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO), the country's gross domestic product (GDP) was expected to slow down to 7.1 per cent in 2016-17 as compared to 7.6 per cent in 2015-16.

The ADB report stated that South Asia's growth dropped by 0.5 percentage points to 6.7 per cent in 2016 on account of slowing growth in INDIA

"Despite stronger government consumption and external demand, growth faltered ini ndia to 7.1 per cent from 7.9 per cent in 2015 as fixed investment languished and demonetisaion temporarily stymied commerce," it said.

Growth in South Asia is forecast to rebound to seven per cent in 2017 and pick up further to 7.2 per cent in 2018, it added.