FM confident of economy clocking over 8.5 pc growth in FY11

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee today exuded confidence that the economy would grow by more than 8.5 per cent this fiscal, despite partial roll back of stimulus measures.

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Saturday exuded confidence that the economy would grow by more than 8.5 per cent this fiscal, despite partial roll back of stimulus measures.

HT Image

Addressing heads of Indian Missions here, Mukherjee said the economy is likely to continue the high growth trajectory in the coming years as well.

Mukherjee said fundamentals of the Indian economy are strong and explained to the heads of Indian Missions how India coped with economic challenges.

Indian economic growth slowed down to 6.7 per cent during 2008-09 from nine per cent in the previous three years after the deepening global financial crisis hit the economy.

To blunt the impact of global crisis, the Government provided stimulus to the economy by cutting taxes and stepping up public expenditure.

This catapulted economic growth to 7.4 per cent last fiscal, despite just 0.2 per cent farm growth because of drought in many parts of the country.

This fiscal, economy is expected to grow by 8.5 per cent despite the government partially rolling back stimulus by raising excise duty by two per cent to 10 per cent.

In fact, the Finance Minister expressed confidence that the economy would grow faster than 8.5 per cent.

The data for the first quarter of this fiscal will be released on Tuesday. The figures will actually show whether the economy faced any adverse impact of partial withdrawal of economic stimulus.