Prime Minister Narendra Modi on February 3 said his priority was for India
to establish global benchmarks in areas such as governance, transparency and
taxation. Interacting over dinner with participants of the BlackRock India
Investor Summit, Modi said the priority of his government was "growth and
jobs". The prime minister said there was rising interest in India,
and "we have to accept that responsibility". Modi said infrastructure
development was one of the best routes to create jobs for the youth. He said India requires
both expansion and upgradation of its infrastructure, and that the railways
could become a growth engine for the economy. Modi also said the goal of
affordable housing for all by 2022, would in itself, provide a huge boost for
the economy. He said the government was focusing on skill development that
would fulfil not just the Indian requirement, but also the global requirement.
In terms of the education system, he said the best in the world should
be there in India
as well.
Modi said he wanted India
to have a skill development programme that focuses on both job-creators and
job-seekers. The prime minister said he believes in a fair, predictable and
consistent tax system, and in economic policies that will drive growth,
according to an official statement. Twenty one major global investors
participated in the India Investor Summit earlier in the day. The list of
institutional investors included asset managers, insurers, pension funds, and
official institutions. The prime minister congratulated Laurence Fink, chairman
and CEO of American multinational investment management firm BlackRock, and the
finance ministry for organising the summit. Union ministers Arun Jaitley, Nitin
Gadkari, Suresh Prabhu, Dharmendra Pradhan, Piyush Goyal and Jayant Sinha were present
at the dinner. Fink had met Modi during the prime minister's US visit in
September. He had then told Modi that his company would be very keen to host a
global investors meet in India
in 2015. Fink made this offer in response to Modi's call for investments.