India remains bankable investment destination: Pilot

Asserting that India remains a bankable investment destination, Union Minister Sachin Pilot has said that maintaining faith of Indian corporates in our economy should be given more importance than being obsessed with ways to boost foreign investments.

Foreign investors would automatically come in if faith of Indian corporates is maintained, as India remains a bankable and favourable destination for investments despite all that "has been written and talked about" the business climate here, the Corporate Affairs Minister said.

"Fundamentals are strong and there is a longevity. There is a deep market, jurisprudence, political stability and good economic fundamentals," Pilot told PTI in an interview.

"My sense is that we have an inherent obsession about foreign investment in this sector and that sector.

"The basic premise should be that if our own Indian corporate sector has faith in economy, system and governance, and they are investing robustly, then foreign investments will come automatically.

"But if we keep looking at Europe, Japan and China that they will invest and don't have the sense of confidence in our own corporate leaders and they don't have it in our economy, then we work at cross purposes," the minister said.

"We must inspire and provide confidence to our own companies and then you will see how there is a beeline of people coming from overseas," Pilot said.

"Our economy is much more resilient and the consumption has not decreased," he said, while adding that this should not mean that "we stop trying and get complacent".

His comments come at a time when there has been widespread concerns about foreign investors no more finding India an attractive place to invest and the economic growth rate has slipped to 4.6 per cent in the April-September period of the current financial year compared to 5.3 per cent in the year-ago period.

To boost growth, the government has taken various measures, including relaxation of foreign direct investment norms in different sectors.

Among various steps, Corporate Affairs Ministry is implementing new Companies Act that would bring in sweeping changes in way corporates function and are regulated here.

The Ministry is also making efforts to improve India's ease of doing business profile and it has also suggested an impact assessment of work done by various regulators.

Taking forward the suggestions made by an expert panel headed by former Sebi Chairman M Damodaran in this regard, the Ministry has written to the Prime Minister so that further actions can be taken on this front.

The government-appointed panel, in its report submitted to the Corporate Affairs Ministry in September last, suggested a string of legal, administrative and regulatory reforms to make the country a better and easier place for doing business.