Indian economy to double GDP to $5 tn in few years: Jaitley

With India's GDP poised to grow at a much faster pace, its economy will double in size to be worth $5 trillion in a few years, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on Thursday.

"With India's GDP poised to grow at a much faster pace, for every few years, we are going to add $1 trillion to our economy.

"We are currently $2 trillion economy. It's only a matter of few years that we will jump from $2 to 3 to 5 trillion which only indicates the kind of expansion which the economy is going to take place," he said addressing the India Investment Promotion Seminar here organised by industry chamber CII and the Indian government's Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP).

"But when the global environment is unsupportive and at times obstructive, where shrinkage of trade is taking place, that is the real test because they say when the going is good everybody is at best. When the going is challenging then to defy the odds, and counter the trends is a real challenge," he added.

Delivering a lecture at the Osaka University here earlier, he said notwithstanding an unsupportive global environment, India registered a GDP growth of 7.9 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2015-16 ended March and 7.6 per cent for the full fiscal.

"India will maintain this paramount position of fastest growing economy in the world. And if we did that we can present ourself as a society which evolves from an emerging economy and moves towards a more developed economy.

"And we have a pipeline of reforms still left over the next few years to be implemented and notwithstanding global slowdown and two years of bad monsoon, we have reached a situation where we still have the highest growth rate in the world," said the finance minister.

High growth and the move towards a more developed economy will help India get rid of social inequalities that still exist, Jaitley added.

"And finally, we can prove to the world that democracy and the economic growth in a country, which historically suffered poverty, can co-exist. You can stabilise your democracy and you can economically grow," he said.

Jaitley is here on the second leg of his six-day visit to Japan aimed at attracting investments from the country to India.

--IANS

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