Note ban just a short-term pain; more 'reforms' ahead: Modi

December 24, 2016

Patalganga, Dec 24: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today hinted at unleashing more radical reforms, saying his government will not shy away from taking difficult decisions that are in national interest and admitted the note ban caused "short-term pain".

pmInaugurating a new educational and training campus of the Sebi-run National Institute of Securities Markets (NISM) in this industrial township near Mumbai, Modi said "the government will unveil more long-term policies that are stable and sound" so as to sustain the higher economic growth rate.

"Our government will continue to follow sound and prudent economic policies and we will not take decisions for short-term political point scoring."

Admitting that the demonetisation drive has caused some "short-term pains" to the public, Modi said this "will bring in benefits in the long-term".

Despite the lingering disagreements between the Centre and the states over the dual control of the GST mechanism, Modi expressed hope that the biggest tax reform the nation has seen till date will be a reality shortly.

Claiming he has transformed the economy since assuming office over 30 months ago, the PM said when he took over the economy was in dire straits with high current account and fiscal deficits, near-double digit inflation and low forex reserves.

In spite of all difficulties, he said his government has improved these key metrics massively since assuming office in May 2014 and today the country is a bright spot in otherwise a gloomy global environment.

Even as the whole world is fighting a prolonged slowdown, "India is being seen as a bright spot with growth projected to be highest amongst the large economies", he said.

Modi said advancing budget presentation will help improve productivity by ensuring adequate resources to all productive sectors of the economy.

Lauding Sebi for facilitating a large number of IPOs this year and helping the capital markets to grow, he said the financial markets are very important for a fast-growing economy.

He underlined the need for developing a robust corporate bond markets so that banks funds can be utilised for other less organised sectors.

Modi asked market watchdog Sebi and Finance Ministry to enable municipalities to tap markets. Stock markets should help in raising capital for productive purposes while the bond market could become a source of long-term infra finance.

The event was attended by Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Maharashtra Governor Vidyasagar Rao, state Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Sebi Chairman U K Sinha and many other officials and senior bankers.

Comments

Fairman
 - 
Saturday, 24 Dec 2016

Dammaya
No need any surprises
Citizens have no more strength to face your crazy adventures.

If you don't have work or boring for God sake please go tour to any country.
If all countries already finished go to Gujrat. Take leave.you need rest

You are very tired of doing crazy chamatkars

Skazi
 - 
Saturday, 24 Dec 2016

low forex reserves ???????????????????????????????????......Blatant lier.....let him quote the figures of Forex reserve now and old .....

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
March 26,2020

New Delhi, Mar 26: Ujjwala beneficiaries will get free gas cylinders (LPG cylinders) in the next three months, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced on Thursday. Addressing a press briefing amid coronavirus pandemic, the finance minister said the announcement is set to benefit 8.3 crore BPL families. 

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
January 31,2020

New Delhi, Jan 31: Substantial competition and low tariff rates by telecom operators since 2016 have led to a financial stress in the sector, the Economic Survey said on Friday.

The data price in the country came down by over 99 per cent during 2016-2019, making it among the lowest tariff in the world, according to the survey.

"Since 2016, the sector has witnessed substantial competition and price cutting by the telecom service providers (TSPs), creating financial stress in the sector. As a result, the sector is experiencing consolidation. While some operators have filed for bankruptcy, others have merged, in their quest to improve viability," the survey report said.

In April-June 2019, the price of data was Rs 7.7 per gigabyte (GB) as compared to Rs 200 per GB in June 2016, it added.

"The Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) for GSM based mobile services has also gone down substantially from Rs 126 in June 2016 to Rs 74.30 in June 2019," the survey said.

The tariff war started in the market with entry of new telecom operator Reliance Jio in September 2016.

"BSNL and MTNL are also affected by the tariff war that has impacted their cash flow resulting in mounting losses," the survey said.

The financial health of the public sector telecom firms plummeted to a level where they have been finding hard to pay employees salaries in time.

The government has drawn up a plan to revive these PSUs which is still in works.

The revival plan consists of several measures, including reduction of staff cost through voluntary retirement scheme, allotment of spectrum for 4G services, monetisation of land and building, tower and fibre assets of BSNL and MTNL, debt restructuring through sovereign guarantee bonds and ''in-principle'' approval for merger of BSNL and MTNL.

The survey said that the wireless telephony now constitutes 98.27 per cent of all subscriptions whereas share of landline telephones now stands at only 1.73 per cent where market share is dominated by private sector players.

"The overall tele-density in India stands at 90.45 per cent, the rural tele-density being 57.35 per cent and urban teledensity being 160.71 per cent at the end of September 2019. The private sector dominates with a share of 88.81 per cent (106.06 crore connections) at the end of September, 2019 while the share of public sector was 11.19 per cent (13.36 crore connections)," the survey said.

The lower price of data has also lead in surge of broadband connections and average consumption of the internet.

Total broadband connections increased by about ten times, from 6.1 crore in 2014 to 59.46 crore in June 2019, the survey said.

The number of internet subscribers (both broadband and narrowband put together) stood at 66.53 crore at the end of June 2019 as compared to 25.16 crore in 2014.

The number of mobile internet subscribers was 64.36 lakh at the end of June 2019 while the number of wireline internet subscribers was 2.17 crore.

"India is now the global leader in monthly data consumption, with average consumption per subscriber per month increasing 157 times from 62 MB in 2014 to 9.8 GB in June 2019. The cost of data has also reduced substantially, enabling affordable internet access for millions of citizens," the survey said.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
February 14,2020

New Delhi, Feb 14: AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal has invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi to his swearing-in ceremony scheduled to take place at the Ramlila Maidan on February 16, senior party leader Gopal Rai said on Friday.

Rai, the convenor of the Aam Aadmi Party's Delhi unit, said a letter was sent to the prime minister on Friday morning.

All seven Delhi MPs and eight newly-elected BJP MLAs have also been invited for the oath-taking ceremony, Rai told news agency.

No chief minister or political leaders from other states will be part of the event as it will be a "Delhi-specific" ceremony, Rai had said on Thursday.

Kejriwal, through front-page advertisements in newspapers, has urged Delhiites to attend his oath-taking ceremony as he is set to become the chief minister of Delhi for the third consecutive term.

Kejriwal will take oath as Delhi Chief minister along with his cabinet at Ramlila Maidan at 10 am on Sunday.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.