Mumbai Feb 22 :- Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday said the government is aiming at a sustained economic recovery and the budgetary proposals on infrastructure building are an attempt to create a multiplier effect to propel growth.
Sitharaman — who is in Mumbai for a two-day post-Budget outreach and to hold interactions with industry stakeholders, large taxpayers and professionals — said banks should focus more on being customer-friendly so that the process of availing credit is easier for borrowers. However, she said this did not mean that banks should take adverse risks.
“We have hence tried balancing the focus on growth and sustained recovery; continuing with the story of investing in public infrastructure building. The Budget has chosen spending on infrastructure as the more favourable route to ensure greater multiplier effect, which will also result in asset creation which can last for several years,” Sitharaman added.
The Finance Minister said the Budget has “messages for sustainability, predictable tax regimen and we continue with the good things we took up last year: such as transparency in accounting.”
Responding to a query of a startup founder who suggested that credit should be available hassle-free, she said, “Banks will have to be a lot more customer friendly. Not to the extent of taking adverse risks which you don’t need to take, but you need to be a lot more friendly to customers.”
She also said the Budget lays a blueprint for the next 25 years. “We want an India which today’s youth can be happy and proud to be living in. We are not only talking about today’s strengths and challenges, but also a future India with technological prowess and technology facilitating and strengthening policy-making.”
Revenue Secretary Tarun Bajaj, who was also present at the interaction, said the balance sheets of both banks and the corporate sector have started looking up.
“We want our growth rate to be high enough in the coming years so that we can help the economy. State Bank of India (SBI) needs to work out some system to push credit into the economy, we request SBI to take leadership and address concerns of MSMEs and large businesses too,” he said.
Sitharaman also said India has been able to leverage technology effectively during the pandemic. “We are building on digital not only for payment, but also for filling the gaps in the education sector the pandemic has caused. We are using technology in agriculture as well, for helping farmers,” she said
On the question of correction in tax inversion, the Finance Minister said that the industry in divided on the issue. She said since a section of the industry is still not ready for it, a decision was taken, in consultation with the GST Council, to not correct the inversion.
‘Govt not against blockchain’
Finance Secretary TV Somanathan on Monday said the government is not against the use of blockchain technology. “The government has nothing against blockchain technology. RBI digital currency itself will be based on a version of blockchain technology,” he said, clarifying that the government’s policy towards blockchain has nothing to do with its policy towards crypto assets or virtual digital assets.
Somanathan said the Coffee Board of India has launched a blockchain system for identifying specific varieties of coffee from specific fields, so that they fetch higher price due to information on availability of its origin.
