TORONTO: Finance minister Arun Jaitley is confident that any economic impact arising from recent tensions with Pakistan and incidents like the surgical strikes undertaken by Indian special forces will be “extremely marginal”.
Jaitley was speaking on Sunday at an event organised by the University of Toronto’s India Innovation Institute in association with the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada. He said, “Let me set at rest any doubt on that score.” He attributed this to“a huge amount of resilience” in the Indian economy.
“Every time we faced a challenge in terms of any geopolitical event, the impact of it on our markets hasn’t been (felt) over a period of time,” he said. Jaitley said that any impact that had been felt on the markets and the rupee had been “temporary”, and that foreign direct investment into India “continues to increase”.
“Even recently, when the news came that India had made certain surgical strikes at the launch pads where the terrorists used to cross into Indian boundaries, there was obviously a certain amount of speculation as far as the markets were concerned. The impact was not what it would have been years ago,” he said, while answering a question from a moderator of the discussion.