'Economy needs to grow yearly at 7-8 percent'

Given the growth-inflation conundrum with the union budget due later this month, Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha Wednesday said the government wants to put the economy on sustainable non-inflationary growth trajectory of over 7 percent.

"We want to put India on a sustainable non-inflationary growth trajectory of seven to eight percent growth. We need to have 7-8 percent growth to provide employment to young people that join the workforce every year," Sinha said here at The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)-organized 15th Delhi Sustainable Development Summit.

"Seven-eight percent growth will double the size of the economy in the next 10 years. For this we need to build our productive capacity, but also need to ensure that our growth is sustainable," he added.

"Climate change is real and significant challenge which every country is facing. So innovation for sustainability is true need of the hour," Sinha said.

The government Friday revised the base year for computing national accounts resulting in the upward economic growth rate of 6.9 percent for 2013-14.

The GDP estimates under the old method was 4.7 percent.

The base year of national accounts was last revised in January 2010.

As a result, the growth rate for 2012-13 has been changed to 5.1 percent under revised norms as against 4.5 percent estimated under the old values.