The new index measuring the output of the country’s services industry, with 2024-25 as the base year, will be released each month with a 60-day lag, the Statistics Ministry said in a list of frequently asked questions (FAQs) on Wednesday (June 24, 2026).

The first-ever Index of Services Production (ISP) for April 2026 will be announced on July 14. The subsequent numbers will be released on the 29th day (or next working day in case of a holiday) of every month, according to the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI).

As a counterpart of the IIP (Index of Industrial Production), which measures the economic growth of the industrial sector, ISP will be a new macroeconomic indicator to measure short-term changes in the growth of the services sector, the Ministry said in a statement.

The conceptual and methodological framework for compiling ISP was finalised in consultation with a technical advisory committee (TAC), which was constituted in May 2025 and headed by Debjani Ghosh of government think tank NITI Aayog. Apart from representatives from academia and the industry associations, the TAC–ISP has members from ministries/departments of the services sector.

The ISP will cover sub-sectors, such as wholesale and retail trade, transport, banking, insurance, telecommunications, hotels & restaurants, real estate, professional, scientific and technical services, arts, entertainment & recreation, among others.

Additionally, two sub-sectors, health and education services, are proposed to be brought into the ISP framework after the report of the Annual Survey of Incorporated Services Sector Enterprises (ASISSE).

The MoSPI, in a list of frequently asked questions (FAQs), has explained that the ISP is a short-term indicator designed to measure changes over time in the volume of output produced by the services sector relative to a specified base period.

The Ministry said that the index measures changes in the real output of diversified services industries over time.

The services sector has emerged as the dominant force in the Indian economy, contributing over 50 per cent of the Gross Value Added since 2013-14. The main aims for compiling ISP are to provide economic trends that would complement IIP and gather high-frequency information on the performance of the services sector to strengthen the existing statistical framework to support analytical and policy frameworks.

The MoSPI will utilise three main data sources for ISP: administrative data, GST returns and ASISSE.

As some of these sources are still evolving and GST data will be used for the first time in statistical applications, trial or experimental ISP indices will be released for some time to observe their stability and resilience, it said, adding that regular compilation and dissemination will take place thereafter.

About the use of deflator, it explained that the ISP tracks short-term changes in the volume of services produced, while primary services data is collected in value terms (nominal value), the index captures the effects of both the prices and value addition.

A price deflator is therefore required to remove the effects of changes in prices from nominal service revenue. It transforms “value-based” (nominal) data into “volume-based” (real) data, allowing measurement of actual changes in service output over time, the Ministry said.