New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi delivered the keynote address at World Economic Forum in Davos on Tuesday.
Delivering his speech in chaste Hindi, PM Modi endorsed India’s economic successes and stressed that the nation is open for business.
“The last time an Indian Prime Minister addressed the Davos forum was in 1997. At that time the GDP of India was only 400 billion dollars. Today, it has been increased by over 6 fold,” said the Prime Minister.
“A predictable, stable, transparent, and progressive India will continue to be the good news in an otherwise state of uncertainty and influx,” PM Modi says.
Recently released data by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has projected 7.4 percent growth for the Indian economy in 2018.
Modi, who is leading India’s largest-ever delegation to Davos to make a case for India on the global stage has received a boost with these figures. It presents an opportunity for the prime minister to defend the short-term economic slowdown back home on account of demonetization and the rollout of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).
Modi spoke at length about demonetization and GST at WEF plenary and said, “More than 1.25 billion Indians accepted in one voice and moved towards a less cash society and a unified tax system in the form of GST. These two historic decisions happened one after the other and in less than a year’s time. We are now a financial system which is fully prepared and integrated for digital transactions. All this has fulfilled our dream and your desire of India as one nation, one tax. It has also started a fresh journey towards a modern tax regime that is transparent, stable and predictable.”
Modi also highlighted other matter of concerns that bother India and the world. Talking about terrorism he said, “Because of our belief in co-existence of races and religions; and because of our belief in non-violence, we have always opposed terrorism. I say with full conviction that terrorism is bad in all its forms and facets. It cannot be a good business to do business with such elements.”
On climate change, the Prime Minister said, “Through Paris Agreement, we have assured the global community that our development process would be entirely in line with our cultural ethos towards environmental safeguards. In fact, we are not only aware of our responsibilities towards climate change; we are willing to take lead in mitigating its effects.”
PM Modi also stressed on India’s commitment to green and renewable energy.
“We have planned to draw 175 GW of energy from renewables by 2022. This includes 100 GW from Solar Energy and another 75 GW from Wind and other sources. We have added more than 14 GW to solar energy generation which was just about 3 GW three years back. With this, we are already the fifth largest producer of solar energy in the world. Not only this, we are also the sixth largest producer of renewable energy.”
Concluding his address by quoting Rabindranath Tagore, PM Modi said, “Tagore had dreamt of a heaven of freedom where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls. Let us join hands to make the world such a heaven of freedom and not divide or fracture it.”
The Indian presence this year in Davos is the largest in the 48-year history of the World Economic Forum with over 100 delegates and PM Modi is the first prime minister to attend the summit in over two decades after Deve Gowda.
