Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will meet industry leaders and heads of various firms on July 29 to discuss possible ways to reverse the rupee’s slide, finance India’s bloated current account deficit and reboot the economy, a government statement said on Monday.
The meeting assumes significance as the government is concerned about the record level of outflows by investors and currency breaching the psychological Rs 60 to a dollar mark. The Centre is looking at means to check the current account and fiscal deficits, including putting a curb on gold imports and deregulating fuel prices.
The rupee on Monday fell to an all-time low of 61.19 against dollar. The CAD in fiscal year 2012-13 was 4.8% of GDP and the government intends to bring it down to 4.2% this financial year.
Singh will also discuss ways to accelerate skill development, besides the development of the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor, Chennai-Bangalore Industrial Corridor and Amritsar-Delhi-Kolkata Industrial Corridor. While the statement did not name any of the leaders
Singh will meet, representatives of the industry bodies such as Ficci, Assocham and CII are expected to attend. Some big names such as HSBC’s Naina Lal Kidwai, Yes Bank’s Rana Kapoor, Videocon’s Venugopal Dhoot, Spice Corp’s Dilip Modi, Infosys’ S Gopalakrishnan and DSCL’s Ajay Shriram are likely to attend.