New Delhi: NITI Aayog member Arvind Virmani has said that the Indian economy will grow at around 6.5 per cent in the current financial year despite high oil prices and rising geopolitical tensions. Virmani further said that he does not see any impact of the US and European banking crisis on the Indian financial sector.
He told PTI-language, “So in the current financial year, due to all the changes that happened last year, I have reduced my India’s economic growth rate by 0.5 percent.” ,Also Read: AI Creates Images Of PM Narendra Modi, Other Global Leaders As Rockstars To Wow Netizens,
Recently, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank projected Indian economic growth to moderate between 6.3 percent and 6.4 percent due to a slowdown in consumption and challenging external conditions. ,Also read: Uday Kotak calls US dollar ‘biggest financial terrorist’, later clarifies,
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) also cut India’s economic growth forecast for the current fiscal to 5.9 per cent from 6.1 per cent earlier. Nevertheless, India will continue to be the fastest growing economy in the world.
Responding to a question on the Reserve Bank of India’s flexible inflation targeting, Virmani said, “We should be more like the US Federal Reserve, which has an inflation target, but also takes into account GDP,” he said.
The government has mandated the central bank to ensure that retail inflation based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) remains at 4 per cent with a margin of 2 per cent on either side.
The central bank, which effected six back-to-back hikes in the key short-term lending rate (repo) from May 2022 to check high inflation, earlier this month decided to take a pause. The cumulative rate hike from May 2022 is 250 basis points.
Asked whether India can replicate the economic success that has made China central to the world economy and a global power, Virmani said he does not think any other country can now be forced to follow China’s unfair trade policies. will be allowed.
“And I estimate that roughly a third of China’s growth would not have happened if China didn’t have these unfair trade policies,” he said. Virmani said India does not follow asymmetric policy and it can grow at 6.5-7 per cent without following unfair trade policies.