PM Modi will be back with ‘good majority’, work on full budget to start soon: FM Sitharaman

New Delhi, May 17 (IANS) Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday said the BJP is confident that Prime Minister Narendra Modi would “come back with a good majority” and discussions for the full budget for 2024-25 would start as soon as the new government is formed.

Addressing the annual event of ‘Apex Business Chamber’ CII, the Finance Minister said India has emerged as the fastest-growing economy in the world and would continue to be the fastest-growing economy in the next few years as well.

She also highlighted the fact that the IMF expects India to contribute as much as 18 per cent of the world’s GDP in the next five years to buttress her point.

The Finance Minister said that the fundamental reason behind this high economic growth was the stability in government policies without any flip-flops and corruption-free decision making which has been going on silently behind the scenes.

She highlighted that the government’s PLI scheme had resulted in transforming the smartphone electronics sector.

“While import dependence for mobile phones was as high as 78 per cent in 2014, today 99 per cent of all mobile phones are made in India,” she remarked.

She pointed out that the success in import substitution in the telecom sector was now as much as 60 per cent, reflecting the higher self-reliance achievement as part of the government’s Aatmanirbhar Bhart policy.

The Finance Minister said that the government had presented only a vote-on-account in February and the preparation for the full budget to give a bigger thrust to economic growth would be taken up as soon as the new government takes over.

She said that the government sees a very big role for the private sector “in our goal of becoming a developed country by 2047 with the government acting as a facilitator and enabler.”

Highlighting the growth prospects ahead, the Finance Minister said the Indian consumer market is poised to double by 2031.

She expressed confidence in the robust health of both the corporate sector's balance sheet and the finance sector's balance sheet to take the growth process ahead.