Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said India should leverage global uncertainty and geopolitical risks as an opportunity to accelerate reforms, strengthen supply chains and enhance its global competitiveness.
Addressing a session on ease of doing business organised by Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India, Goyal said the government was working to position India as a trusted destination for investments and exports as the country moves towards the goal of Viksit Bharat 2047.
“I have absolutely no doubt that we will convert the current situation and the risks associated with the geopolitics around the world into an opportunity for faster reform, into preparing ourselves for greater resilience, make our supply chains stronger,” Goyal said.
The minister added that India, under the leadership of Narendra Modi, had consistently turned crises into opportunities, stating that challenging times often bring out the best in businesses.
Highlighting India’s expanding trade partnerships, Goyal said 38 countries across nine free trade agreements (FTAs) were now opening up opportunities for Indian businesses. However, he cautioned that FTAs were a “two-way street” and stressed the need for industries to actively promote exports and attract investments.
“Unless businesses encash the opportunity for inviting investments and promoting exports, you can jolly well land up with a situation where more imports come in and we don’t take the benefit of the open markets,” he said.
Goyal said India had emerged as a competitive manufacturing and services hub, adding that productive imports such as data centres and precision capital goods were essential growth enablers. He emphasised the need to increase exports of value-added products across sectors including automobiles, electronics, consumer goods and agro-based industries.
On industrial infrastructure, the minister said the government had consulted stakeholders to identify locations for 100 new industrial parks under the BHAVYA initiative, with work already underway on 20 parks.
He also backed the creation of a single authority at each industrial park to function as a one-stop platform for approvals and urged greater private sector participation in the National Single Window System.
Referring to the ongoing crisis in West Asia, Goyal said there was no need for panic and called for a strategic response.
“We don’t need to panic. We need to be smart,” he said, while citing lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The minister highlighted the growth of more than 1,800 Global Capability Centres (GCCs) in India, which he said had generated nearly two million direct and 10 million indirect jobs.
“Our IT industry is aspiring to be a trillion dollars in the next 10 years. It’s very much eminently doable,” he said, adding that Indian talent was well-positioned to convert artificial intelligence platforms into scalable applications.
Goyal further said the government was supporting the expansion of data centres through low-cost data, renewable energy availability, a strong national grid and 100 per cent tax exemption for cloud services exported from India until 2047.
According to the minister, these investments would create a “virtuous cycle” benefiting real estate, talent development, equipment manufacturing and the broader economy.
(With ANI inputs)
