Economic indicators show encouraging signs of recovery in post-COVID India: PM Modi

The economic indicators show encouraging signs of recovery in post-COVID India, says Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He pointed out that the way India handled the pandemic crisis through concerted effort has taken the world by surprise.

Addressing the 93^rd Annual Convention of Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) on Saturday, PM Modi said various measured taken by the government in the last six years has instilled confidence among global investors. “As a result, India has seen record Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and Foreign Portfolio Investment inflows during the pandemic.”

He highlighted that the government, in the last six years, has encouraged stakeholders in all sectors and this is reflected in the all-round reforms in sectors ranging from manufacturing to MSME; agriculture to infrastructure; from tech industry to taxation; and from real estate to regulatory easing.

Production Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme

“The government has introduced production linked incentive (PLI) scheme to promote sunrise sectors and technology-based industries,” the prime minister said. “This scheme is for those industries which are on path to make India a global champion and those who would perform would be entitled to the incentive.” The government had recently approved the PLI scheme, worth up to Rs 2 lakh crore, for 10 manufacturing sectors for next five years. The sectors include automobiles and auto components, pharmaceuticals drugs, specialty steel, capital goods, technology products, white goods (ACs and LEDs), telecom and networking products, textiles, high efficiency solar PV modules and advanced battery cells.

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Amitabh Kant, NITI Aayog CEO, said the objective was to provide a major impetus to manufacturing and exports. He described the PLI scheme as one of the biggest schemes that the government has come out with to support the private sector in manufacturing. “It is a $26 billion scheme which provides PLI in 10 champion sectors and this five years of support should spur growth in manufacturing in a big way.”