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Structural changes to the agriculture sector, increasing import duties to boost local manufacturing, and clarity on the government’s plans for dilution of ownership of public sector banks topped the wishlist of participants at BusinessLine ’s Count Down to Union Budget 2019 event in Mumbai on Friday.
The government should consider raising the maximum cap on the import duty that can be imposed on steel from 15 per cent to 40 per cent to protect the steel industry, which is reeling from slowing domestic demand and rising imports, Seshagiri Rao, Joint Managing Director, JSW Steel, said during a panel discussion on the manufacturing sector.
Discussing the country’s agriculture sector, another panel felt that farmers’ problems need to redefined, and newer policies formulated in keeping with the changed paradigm.
Differentiated banking
Leading a panel discussion on the BFSI sector, B Rajkumar, Deputy Chief Executive, Indian Banks’ Association, raised the issue of differentiated banking and said the government can look at having different banks to serve the requirements of different sectors of the economy. “The government can have differentiated banks — one for the weaker section, one for MSMEs, and two-three simply doing commercial business. That is the only way,” said Rajkumar even as he emphasised that his views were personal.
Delivering the keynote address, Satish Marathe, Director, Central Board of the RBI, said India needs to focus on MSMEs to improve local manufacturing and truly kickstart the ‘Make in India’ initiative. “India imports everything, from a pin to a piano,” Marathe said.
“In the past 20-25 years, the share of manufacturing in the overall GDP has been constantly going down, and nothing much has been done to boost it. We need to re-look our trade and tariff policies to boost manufacturing,” he added.
The event themed — Rebooting Growth — was sponsored by Shriram Transport Finance Company and Multi Commodity Exchange of India. NSE was the venue partner and NewsX, the media partner.
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