Modi invites entrepreneurs to India

Hyderabad: Showcasing his government's reforms, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday invited global entrepreneurs to come to India saying that it provides an investment-friendly environment where restrictions have been removed, and archaic laws abolished.

Speaking at Global Entrepreneur Summit 2017, he said over 1,200 outdated laws have been scrapped, 87 rules for foreign investment eased in 21 sectors and several government processes have been taken online.

"To my entrepreneur friends from across the globe, I would like to say, 'Come, Make in India, Invest in India', for India and the world," he said. "I invite each one of you to become a partner in India's growth story. And once again assure you of our wholehearted support."

Ivanka Trump, US President Donald Trump's daughter and advisor to the White House, is leading a US delegation to the summit and gave the keynote address.

Stating that an investment-friendly environment needs to be stable from the macroeconomic perspective, Modi said his government has succeeded in containing the fiscal and current account deficits as well as curbing inflation.

"Our foreign reserves have crossed $400 billion, and we continue to attract large foreign capital flows," he said.

To young entrepreneur friends from India, he said: "Each of you has something valuable to contribute towards creating a New India by 2022. You are vehicles of change and instruments of India's transformation."

Listing out business-friendly measures the government has undertaken, Modi said loans worth Rs 4.28 trillion (Rs 4.28 lakh crore) had been sanctioned under the entrepreneurship loan scheme, MUDRA.

Under the 'Atal Innovation Mission', Tinkering Labs are being opened in more than 900 schools to promote a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship among children, he said.

After taking electricity to almost all villages, a new scheme, 'Saubhagya' will provide electrical connection to all the unelectrified families by December 2018, he said, adding that a programme to provide high-speed broadband Internet to all rural areas by March 2019 has also been launched.

"We are working on developing a national gas grid. A comprehensive national agency policy is also in the pipeline," he said.

The Prime Minister said the taxation system had been overhauled with the launch of GST, while the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code has been introduced to ensure timely resolution for stressed ventures.

"We have recently strengthened this further, preventing wilful defaulters from bidding for stressed assets," he said.

"Tough measures have been adopted to tackle the parallel economy, check tax evasion and control black money."

The government, he said, understands that an environment of transparent policies and the rule of law providing a level playing field are necessary for entrepreneurship to flourish.

Modi said Aadhaar, the world's most extensive biometric-based digital database, covers over 1.15 billion people and digitally authenticates over 40 million transactions daily.

"We now digitally provide monetary benefits of various government schemes to the beneficiaries through Direct Benefit Transfer using Aadhaar," he added.

On financial inclusion, he said almost 300 million bank accounts with deposits of over Rs 685 billion had been opened through the Jan Dhan Yojna. "These bring un-banked sections of society previously into the formal financial system. Of these, 53 percent account are women."

"We are steadily working towards a less cash economy and have launched a Unified Payment Interface App called BHIM. In less than a year, this platform is facilitating almost 280,000 transactions daily," he said.