My priorities are growth, jobs: Modi to investors

New Delhi, Feb 4:

Prime Minister Narendra Modi Tuesday said his priority was for India to establish global benchmarks in areas such as governance, transparency and taxation.

Interacting over dinner with participants of the BlackRock India Investor Summit, Modi said the priority of his government was “growth and jobs”.

The prime minister said there was rising interest in India, and “we have to accept that responsibility”.

Modi said infrastructure development was one of the best routes to create jobs for the youth.

He said India requires both expansion and upgradation of its infrastructure, and that the railways could become a growth engine for the economy.

Modi also said the goal of affordable housing for all by 2022, would in itself, provide a huge boost for the economy.

He said the government was focusing on skill development that would fulfil not just the Indian requirement, but also the global requirement.

In terms of the education system, he said the best in the world should be there in India as well.

Modi said he wanted India to have a skill development programme that focuses on both job-creators and job-seekers.

The prime minister said he believes in a fair, predictable and consistent tax system, and in economic policies that will drive growth, according to an official statement.

Twenty one major global investors participated in the India Investor Summit earlier in the day.

The list of institutional investors included asset managers, insurers, pension funds, and official institutions.

The prime minister congratulated Laurence Fink, chairman and CEO of American multinational investment management firm BlackRock, and the finance ministry for organising the summit.

Union ministers Arun Jaitley, Nitin Gadkari, Suresh Prabhu, Dharmendra Pradhan, Piyush Goyal and Jayant Sinha were present at the dinner.

Fink had met Modi during the prime minister’s US visit in September.

He had then told Modi that his company would be very keen to host a global investors meet in India in 2015.

Fink made this offer in response to Modi’s call for investments. (IANS)