PM Modi promises to make India easiest place to do business

Gandhinagar: Promising a predictable and fair policy environment and stable tax regime, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday assured the global community that India would be the easiest place to do business.

Since day one, my government is actively working to revive the economy. My government is committed to creating a policy environment that is predictable, transparent and fair, he told an audience comprising US Secretary of State John Kerry, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and top global and domestic CEOs. Modi, who assumed office as Prime Minister in May last year after BJP stormed to power with a huge mandate, said that the atmosphere of despair and uncertainty has gone away within a very short span of seven months. Speaking at the Vibrant Gujarat Summit, conceived in 2003 by Modi as the state Chief Minister then, he told investors, the government will hold your hands whenever needed...If you walk one step, we will walk two steps for you. Ease of doing business in India, he added, is a prime concern for you and for us. I assure you that we are working very seriously on these issues. We want to make them not only easier than earlier; not only easier than the rest; but we want to make them the easiest. Seeking to address concerns of investors, Modi said, We are trying to complete the circle of economic reforms speedily. We are also keen to see that our policies are predictable. We are clear that our tax regime should be stable. In the last few months, we have taken several decisions in this direction. He also brushed aside the criticism that nothing was happening on the ground by stressing that we are not only making commitments and announcements. We are also backing them up with concrete action. The government in the past seven months relaxed foreign direct norms in various sectors including defence and insurance, launched 'Make In India' campaign and resorted to ordinance to pursue changes in land acquisition norms to promote investment. Annual trade between goods and services between US and India has grown nearly five-fold since 2000. Bilateral FDI now stands at nearly USD 30 billion, Kerry said. ...I want to ensure that our economic relationship grows stronger in every respect. We share PM Modi's goal of increasing our countries annual trade five-fold in years ahead and we want to expand our commercial ties ...we can take this relationship to the new heights that we envision, he said. India and the US have a common responsibility, together with other country partners, to prove that democracies can deliver for their citizens, he said.

 Flagging concerns over climate change, Kerry said it was affecting crop production, economy and raising cost of doing business.