Arun Jaitley focuses on growth, price rise

New Delhi: India’s new finance and corporate affairs minister Arun Jaitley said on Tuesday that bringing inflation down, reviving growth and lifting investors confidence will be the priority of the BJP led NDA government. Mr Jaitley also met the RBI governor Raghuram Rajan even when there has been media speculation as to how the relationship between the new government and Dr Rajan will turn out. The first test for the relationship between the RBI governor and the new finance minister will be the next bi-monthly monetary policy review on June 3.

“The challenges are very obvious. We have to restore the pace of growth, contain inflation and obviously concentrate on fiscal consolidation,” said Mr Jaitley after taking up the charge of the finance ministry.
Mr Jaitley said that he was taking over at a very challenging time, particularly when there is a need to rebuild the confidence of the Indian economy.  He said that he had inherited a “lot of unpaid bills” and a strained economy.

On whether Mr Jaitley would focus on inflation at cost of growth, the new finance minister said “the balancing act” will have to be done. “The mandate with which our government has received an inbuilt hope in it...The political change itself sends a strong signal to the global community as well as the domestic investors. I think over the next two months by expediting decision making processes we will be able to build on that,” said Mr Jaitley.

After the meeting with the finance minister, Dr Rajan said that fighting inflation would continue to be a top priority, alth-ough the central bank will also aim to strike a balance between promoting economic growth and containing inflation. The two discussed the prevailing economic situation as well as the issues related to the rise in prices.

Mr Jaitley was also briefed on the key initiatives and policy issues by the secretaries of the different departments of the ministry of finance. He  also held a meeting with the senior officials of the ministry to have a first hand information regarding the ongoing issues and the forthcoming challenges facing the Ind-ian economy among others. Finance secretary Arvind Mayaram said fiscal consolidation, fiscal deficit, gold imp-ort curbs and diesel price decontrol were discussed.