Tag: India tax system

Buoyed by renewed global confidence in the India story, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has raised the bar by declaring a new ambitious target of scaling up the Indian economy 10-fold to $20 trillion. To make sure that his claim was not seen as grandiose showmanship, the Indian prime minister unveiled a raft of reforms, including reforming country’s the labyrinthine tax system to attract foreign investment and streamlining the governance system to make it faster and more effective.

Underlining the importance of fast-tracking institutional reforms, Mr Modi declared at a business conclave, organised by The Economic Times, that he was preparing the ground to turn India into a $20-trillion economy from $2 trillion. “In 20 years of liberalisation, we have not changed a command-and-control mindset. We think it is okay for government to meddle in the working of firms. This must change,” he said in New Delhi in a speech that was generously interspersed with the word reform and its improvisations.

However, in a carefully-worded formulation, the prime minister made it clear that his government would not cut subsidies that will adversely impact the poor. “I believe that subsidies are needed for them (poor). What we need is a well-targeted system of subsidy delivery. We need to cut subsidy leakages,” he told the country’s industry titans in New Delhi January 16.