Pranab confident of India attracting FDI in infra

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said in New York on Wednesday that India should be able to attract more direct foreign investments for its infrastructure sector with the ongoing overhauling of the regulatory mechanism.

'I think we will be able able to inspire confidence in the minds of prospective investors,' Mukherjee told journalists during a 10-minute press conference just after a closed-door meeting with a high-profile group of 50-odd American investors.

The forum was organized jointly by Institutional Investors and FICCI at the Grand Hyatt in midtown Manhattan.

'We are aware of the huge investment projections till 2017 and more than 50 per cent of which are to come from the private sector,' he said.

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Mukherjee said that this will be achieved by overhauling the regulatory mechanism, by providing the sanctions and other clearances expeditiously, and by making the procedural and regulatory aspects transparent and predictable.

'We are issuing the guidelines, addressing the problems and concerns of the prospective investors, and in that process I think we will be able to inspire confidence in the minds of the prospective investors,' Mukherjee said.

In response to a question the minister said that India will have a 7.7 per cent growth rate in the first quarter depending on the monsoon.

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'A good monsoon will ensure that agriculture (growth) is not less than four per cent and manufacturing and service sector, particularly the growth of the service sector, clearly indicate that it will be possible for us to have growth of around eight per cent this year,' Mukherjee said.

He said that India has projected a nine per cent growth rate.

'We are taking that approach and steps are being taken for that and we will continue that, he said airing his concern about international environment, particularly the high sovereign debt of the euro.'

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'Also the slow recovery in the industrialised countries, inflationary pressure and volatility of the capital in emerging markets are posing serious issues that I am concerned.

But at the same time as the collective leadership of the international community has been to address the problems that arose of the 2008 crisis, we will be able to overcome those crises and ensure that India's growth will be eight percent plus,' the finance minister said.

The finance minister, before leaving this evening for Washington to attend the IMF/World meetings slated for Thursday, also addressed an USIBC meeting at the Metropolitan Club before briefly visiting the Asia Society that opened its exhibition Rabindranath Tagore: The Last Harvest earlier this month.