Growth may have slowed down but there is no recession in the country: Finance Minister

On Wednesday, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharman told the Rajya Sabha that there is no recession but the growth “may have come down”. She has admitted it amongst the increasing Opposition attacks that the economy is slipping into recession.

Replying to the four-hour-long discussion on the state of the economy, Sitharaman says that economic growth may have slowed down, but there is no recession.

She mentioned that indicators such as foreign exchange reserves, domestic supply, consumption and management of inflation are much better than it were during the UPA regime.

According to her, FDI inflows in 2009-14 were $189.5 billion and they were $283.9 billion under BJP rule in the following five years. The foreign exchange reserves rose to $412.6 billion from $304.2 billion in UPA-II. Identification of the problems, recapitalisation, resolution of the problems and reforms has helped the banking sector, while measures such as merger of banks were part of the banking reforms. Revenue expenditure, capital expenditure and capital receipts have also increased.

She feels it is not at all right to say that everything has come down.