Jaitley counters: boosted economy, inflation down

Arun Jaitley at Karnali village in Vadodara on Tuesday. “It is my dream to transform Karnali into one of the most modern villages,” he said.

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Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his adopted village of Karnali in Vadodara (Express Photo By Bhupendra Rana)

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said Tuesday that in its one year in office, the Narendra Modi government has reversed the state of the economy.

Jaitley was speaking to reporters in Ahmedabad where he launched a short film and a publication to mark NDA government’s one year in office. Ruling out the Opposition’s allegations of constant price rise, he said: “They left behind an inflation rate of 11 per cent. Today, Consumer Price Index is about 5 per cent and wholesale price index is negative.”

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The Finance Minister also said that in the past one year, Non-Performing Asset levels of public sector banks had come down.

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“There was economic slackness during the UPA regime. The industries couldn’t perform well and repayments were slow. When we came to power, the NPAs of public sector banks hovered around 6 per cent. Today, they have come down to about 5.2 per cent for the March quarter as against 5.64 per cent in the previous quarter,” he said.

Jaitley said this shouldn’t be considered a complete recovery. “These are patchy corrections. We have to wait for two-three more quarters to show sustained recovery,” he said.

Reacting to the Congress allegation of irregularities in the purchase of Rafale Jets, he said, “It is a government to government deal and the Congress should study it.’’

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