Kolkata: Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee
on Thursday said a balance has to be stuck on the issue of
continuity of the stimulus packages.
"The aim is to maintain growth," Mukherjee said while
addressing the members of the Indo-American Chamber of
Commerce here today, adding the package should not be
prolonged so as to make public debt hard and prevents the
private sector from accessing resources because of huge
government borrowing.
"It (the withdrawal of the stimulus measures) should not
be too early as well as it could have adverse impact on the
economy," he said, however, refused to set deadline to review
the stimulus packages.
The Government has pumped in Rs 2.20 lakh crore into the
economy as stimulus packages from December 2008 through
February this year, to revive the sagging economy following
the global financial meltdown that started last September with
the fall of the Wall Street titans.
As a result, the fiscal deficit has ballooned to 6.8 per
cent. Mukherjee however, was categorical in stating that such
high deficit cannot be sustained. At the same time, the
Finance Minister said he is against any hasty withdrawal of
the stimulus measures, as it is too early to conclude that the
economy has firmly come out of the morass.
Mukherjee hoped that the growth momentum recorded in Q2
would be maintained in Q3 and Q4 and the overall GDP growth
for the fiscal would cross 7.5 per cent. The first and second
quarter GDP growth of the current fiscal was 6.1 and 7.9 per
cent respectively.
Apprehensive about the role of agriculture in Q3, the
minister said the farm numbers could be negative due to the
severe drought and the resultant damage to Kharif crop in that
many regions.
In the first quarter, the contribution of agriculture was
2.5 per cent, but in Q2 it made a nosedive to 0.91 per cent.
Mukherjee had earlier said the deficit in agriculture
in the third quarter would be compensated by industrial growth
touching the double digit figure.
FM to devote one month for pre-budget interaction
Union Finance Minister Pranab
Mukherjee today said he will spend an entire month interacting
with all stakeholders and look into their suggestions and
proposals to be included in the budget.
"I will spend a full one month interacting with all
stakeholders for suggestions and proposals for budget,"
Mukherjee said here.
Stating that he would not speak about policy matters
till the Union budget, Mukherjee said, "I will have
interactions with trade bodies, trade unions, state finance
ministers, the cooperative sector and the private and public
sector to expose myself to suggestions for the budget."
He indicated that the government was looking into the
problems of the small and medium sector.
To a question Mukherjee said, "there will always be a
gap between what should be done and what can be done.
The Union Budget is usually presented on the last day
of February every year.
PTI
First Published: Thursday, December 31, 2009, 18:46