Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on Tuesday address dozens of central government ministries, states and financial sector regulators in the inaugural session of a webinar that aims to firm up strategies to implement key Budget proposals, especially on infrastructure creation, effectively.
The webinar on “Financing for Growth and Aspirational Economy”, organised by the finance ministry, will be attended by representatives of 16 ministries, Niti Aayog, Capacity Building Commission, state governments and regulators like RBI, Sebi, IFSCA and IRDAI. They will brainstorm with experts from the public and private sector experts, investors, academia and industry, the finance ministry said in a statement on Sunday.
They will participate in 5 breakaway sessions on the financing of infrastructure; financing sectors with high employment potential; creating enablers of infrastructure; navigating the digital opportunity for banking and finance; and climate and sustainable finance and financing for sunrise sectors.
To ensure that the ongoing economic recovery takes root, the Centre has budgetted a 36% jump in its capital spending to a record Rs 7.5 lakh crore for FY23 from the revised estimate for FY22 (excluding capital infusion into Air India), with particular focus on infrastructure creation.
Its capex next fiscal will more than double from the pre-pandemic (FY20) level. The Budget’s “commitment towards asset creation (public infrastructure development) will invigorate the virtuous cycle of investment and crowd in private investment with large multiplier effects which in turn will augment inclusive and sustainable growth”, the finance ministry had said in its report for January.
The Budget has projected a real growth rate of about 8% for the next fiscal. This is in sync with the growth rate of 8-8.5% projected by the latest Economic Survey and is close to the central bank’s forecast of 7.8% for FY23. The National Statistical Office has forecast 8.9% growth for the current fiscal after a 7.3% contraction in real GDP in FY21 in the wake of the pandemic.
