India's Finance Minister P Chidambaram said Wednesday that India can raise its GDP to 9 percent if the country is able to develop its infrastructure and mobilize the investment.
"Money is flowing into the country and if we can mobilize these investments and channel them into infrastructure development, India's GDP will easily rise to 9 percent a year, " Chidambaram said addressing the second annual India Investment Forum here in New York September 21.
Chidambaram, who also addressed the forum last year, said in his keynote address that the most important thing for India is to focus on infrastructure development.
"India today has built huge capacity for almost every type of industry but to support this we need to pay much greater attention to infrastructure," he said.
About 300 guests including institutional investors from American companies attended the keynote address at the Pierre hotel in midtown Manhattan.
He said the government has understood the importance of building infrastructure because without much better infrastructure, it will not be possible to do justice to the GDP growth rate.
Saying
"The government is determined to put in a world class infrastructure to push all round growth," he told the audience.
The minister noted that while the FIIs have been coming to India, the FDI has not really measured up to expectations. He said that the fault may lie with the government for not being able to project properly the attraction for FDI.
"That is why I am here today to address the concerns that people may have on FDI," he said. "I wish to say that if India is good enough to attract FIIS, India is good enough to attract FDI as well."
Earlier, Stan O'Neal chairman and CEO of Merrill Lynch and Company made a brief presentation on India, highlighting its strengths and achievements in recent years.
Among those who addressed the morning session were A K Purwar, Chairman of the State Bank of India and M Damodaran, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India.