Delhi poll loss won’t slow economic reforms: Jaitley

The minister’s comments come just weeks ahead of the Union Budget 2015-16 that will be presented on February 28. In the upcoming Budget session, the Centre is also expected to table Bills on insurance and land, for which it had promulgated ordinances.

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Expressing hope that the economy is poised to take off at a much faster pace now, Jaitley asserted that the government is determined to go ahead on the path of economic reforms. “We believe the kind of reforms we are bringing will bring in investments… improve the quality of life and alleviate poverty levels,” he said.

Meanwhile, US treasury secretary Jacob Lew said that India should look at re-balancing its priorities in the Budget by making more expenditure available for infrastructure and reviewing subsidies. “Additional reforms are necessary and increase in public investment combined with a more open investment climate and a deeper financial sector would help attract private infrastructure investment,” he said.

Lew, however, appreciated the efforts made by the Modi government on reforms to attract foreign investments in the infrastructure sector and also expressed satisfaction at the faster resolution of many tax disputes. “There has been real progress in resolving many of these disputes that have lingered on for long,” he said.

The two countries also discussed measures to check terror funding and money laundering. “There were several sectors about which we had detailed discussions — the financial sector, the macro-economic situation in both the countries, taxation, banking, problems facing entire world with regard to funding of terrorism,” Jaitley said.

The minister further said that cooperation at global level is needed to check money laundering, adding that the issue of India becoming a part of Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), which will lead to automatic exchange of information, were discussed at the meeting.