6.5 per cent growth target looks difficult: PM

With global economy not doing well, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said it may not be possible to achieve growth target of 6.5 per cent for the current fiscal envisaged in February.
However, he hoped that the economy will rebound as the government was taking all steps to boost investments.
"I would not like to make a forecast of what our growth will be in the year 2013-14. The IMF has recently reduced its earlier projection of growth rates for all countries including India, for 2013," he said at a function here.
"We had targeted 6.5 per cent growth at the time the Budget was presented. But it looks as if it will be lower than that," he said.

Pinning hopes on the agriculture sector, the Prime Minister said plentiful rains so far will help revive demand in rural areas which will contribute to stronger industrial performance in due course.
"Industrial growth has not yet recovered. However, I am happy to say that agriculture looks well set to show a good performance," he said.

The country's economic growth has hit a decade low of 5 per cent last fiscal on account of poor performance of farm, manufacturing and mining sectors.
Highlighting the UPA regime's performance, Singh said the average growth rate during eight years (2004-05 to 2012-13) was 8.2 per cent. This is much better than 5.7 per cent achieved in the previous eight years.

He also said that the real wages have risen much faster rate of 6.8 per cent per year in the 11th plan period as compared to an average of 1.1 per cent annually in the 10 years preceding it.