India's growth drivers intact, govt committed to reforms: FM

PRANAB-GROWTH
New Delhi, June 13 (PTI) Dismissing fears of a
slowdown, Indian Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee Monday said
India's growth drivers are intact and the Centre is committed
to policy reforms.
"Though there is some slowdown in industrial growth,
partly due to the base effect from the previous year, the
growth drivers of the Indian economy remain broadly intact,"
Mukherjee said at a seminar organised by his ministry and the
Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Factory output slowed down to 6.3 per cent (vis-a-vis
a 2004-05 base) in April, 2011, from 13.1 per cent in the
corresponding month of the previous year.
Mukherjee said the medium-term growth prospects for
the economy remain buoyant.
"I am confident that we are in a position to sustain
high economic growth in the coming years and create a more
inclusive outcome of our society," he said.
India aims to grow at 9-9.5 per cent during the XIIth
Five-Year Plan, starting April, 2012.
"It would imply raising the average growth rate by at
least one percentage point from 8.2 per cent, likely to be
realised in the XIth Plan," he said.
Mukherjee further said that the government was
committed to policy reforms.
"Major steps have been taken to simplify and place the
administrative procedures concerning taxation, trade and
traffic and social transfers on electronic interface, free of
discretion and bureaucratic delays," he said.
The Direct Taxes Code (DTC) is scheduled to become
operational from April 1, 2012, while a constitutional
amendment bill on Goods and Services Tax (GST) was introduced
in Parliament earlier this year. PTI NKD
SSB