Jaitley meets PM, discusses economic performance

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Tuesday met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and is believed to have discussed the performance of the economy in the past seven months.

The meeting comes at a time when the finance ministry is in the process of firming up proposals for the 2015-16 Budget to be unveiled by Jaitley in February.

Modi had on Monday at Make in India workshop said the government was ready to change laws and rules to boost manufacturing sector. The economy has shown signs of pick up in the past seven months and is estimated to record a growth rate of 5.5 per cent in the current financial year. Jaitley in a Facebook post on Sunday has said his first priority would be to arrest the slowdown in growth.

"The Government in the past few months has undertaken several reforms. More are to follow ... The manufacturing slowdown has to be reversed. Changes and reforms which impact favourably on the manufacturing sector have to be undertaken. That is a focus which I intend to pursue," he wrote.