Tech, ease of doing biz will help achieve 8 per cent growth: Nirmala Sitharaman

She said the government is working on three important pillars, including the goods and services tax, JAM (Jan Dhan, Aadhaar and Mobile) and ease of doing business.

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Sri Lanka Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe with Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman during the opening day of India Economic Summit in New Delhi on Thursday. (Source: PTI)

India can achieve 8 per cent economic growth through technology, improvement in ease of doing business and the Central government working closely with the states, Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Thursday. “It (8 per cent growth) is achievable and with this commitment, the government is working. And across the states, we find that urge now that they want to get out of the rigmarole and see brighter ways,” she said at the India Economic Summit jointly organised by CII and World Economic Forum.

Awareness about the difficulties on which the Centre and the states need to work to push growth is helping politically too. “… the kind of issues on which we have to come together and get over the difficulties are actually helping politics. If only you succeed in removing these obstructions and if you are committed to moving forward on using technologies, making sure transparent processes are established, I can see that 8 per cent growth is moving. So, it is achievable,” she said.

India’s GDP grew at 7.1 per cent in April-June of the current fiscal, its slowest in the last six quarters, mainly due to slower growth in construction and agriculture sectors and contraction in the mining sector, as per the Central Statistics Office (CSO) data. The growth during the quarter was much lower than 7.9 per cent recorded in January-March and 7.5 per cent registered in April-June last year.

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She said the government is working on three important pillars, including the goods and services tax, JAM (Jan Dhan, Aadhaar and Mobile) and ease of doing business to promote growth and investments. The government is using technology to remove corruption and bring in transparency, the minister said, adding that “we need to work harder and we need to take the states on board…”. In the next 4-5 months, “our attention would be to work together with them, take out all those which are obstructionists and ensure businesses feel far more assured that the ease is actually coming in”.

FDI is coming in, “but we have to translate that into meaningful investments and rapidly get them on to translate into job creation… so, these are things on which we are working,” Sitharaman said.”There is a comprehensive agenda of work which is pending, which is ongoing but more to achieve. So, there are going to be an inter-ministerial work assessment and also ensuring work moves fast. The inter-ministerial will also be happening just to ensure this goal is achieved.”