Exulted by the double-digit economic growth rate, Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani, said on Thursday that the staggering gross domestic product of 10.4 per cent was another example of "all round feel-good".

"This morning I learnt that GDP growth in the third quarter of this fiscal was a staggering 10.4 per cent. This is good news and another example of all round feel good," Advani said in a statement on the second leg of his 'Bharat Uday Yatra' in Himmatnagar in Gujarat.

India's Growth Projections for 2003-04

Advani, however, said the impediments in the path of agriculture must be removed so as to sustain this growth rate and even improve on it.

Dwelling on "acute" water scarcity, he said, "For me, each of the yatras I have undertaken has been a learning process. During this yatra, I have gauged the depth of one problem that seems to plague most of the states I have so far visited -- the scarcity of water."

He said whether it is the Cauvery waters in Tamil Nadu and southern Karnataka, the Krishna waters in northern Karnataka, the Godavri waters in Andhra Pradesh and Narmada waters in Gujarat, the problem is acute.

The Deputy Prime Minister said it has been compounded by a severe drought two years ago and in some states, by the long-term neglect of traditional methods of water conservation.