India Inc asks Centre to boost spend

New Delhi: The Indian industry on Thursday appealed to the government to review its fiscal deficit target to increase public spending to help in economic growth. The representatives of the Indian industry have met commerce and industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman to discuss ways to promote start-ups and boost economic growth.

“Given the need to support economic recovery, we feel that public investments, particularly in infrastructure, need to be stepped up even next year. For this, we need to recalibrate the fiscal deficit target a bit, if required,” said industry chamber Ficci. The industry body said that it is good to note that the focus of the government is on productive expenditure that adds to the capacity of the economy and not on consumptive expenditure. Ficci also reiterated the need to review the existing Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) from the point of view of domestic competitiveness of the manufacturing sector. Responding to industry representatives, commerce and industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the ministry would take inputs from the industry at the time of review of these pacts.

India has so far signed free trade pacts with countries including Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Asean. Further, an official who attended the meeting said the minister asked the industry to become more competitive and also allayed apprehensions about the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal. She informed the industry about India’s focus on CLMV countries (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam).