More measures to boost economy as and when required: Finance Minister

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday promised more stimulus measures for sectors of ecomy in distress as she counted on steps taken till w to boost growth by driving up consumption. She also said Centre is aware of pending GST compensation to states and will hour its commitment.

Addressing a press conference on state of ecomy along with senior officials, Sitharaman said government will continue to take measures as and when required to boost growth.

Asked by when she expects ecomy to revive, she said, "I'm t engaging in any prediction based thing. I am looking at ecomy, where I need to intervene, I am intervening and I shall continue to address problem of industry affected by crisis."

She declined to comment on narrative of stagflation -- high inflation coupled with declining growth. " comment on that. I have heard it. Stagflation is a narrative which is going on. I am hearing it," she said.

Rising food prices pushed retail inflation in vember to an over three-year high of 5.54 per cent, while industrial sector output shrank for third month in a row by 3.8 per cent in October, indicating deepening slowdown in ecomy, government data showed on Thursday.

Many ecomists, including former RBI Goverr Raghuram Rajan, have expressed fear of India getting into stagflation mode.

India's ecomic growth slowed to a 6-year low of 4.5 per cent in July-September quarter. With inflation rising, fears of stagflation -- a fall in aggregate demand accompanied by rising inflation -- have resurfaced.

Ahead of crucial meeting of GST Council, Sitharaman also said buzz of an increase in GST rates is everywhere or than her office.

She was responding to a question on talk of current Goods and Services Tax (GST) rates of 5, 12, 18 and 28 per cent being raised to make up for fall in revenues that has even hampered giving compensation to states for loss of revenue from implementation of indirect tax regime.

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"Buzz is everywhere or than my office," she remarked. Sitharaman, however, did t rule out a hike in GST rates, saying her ministry is yet to apply its mind to it. She furr said re is denying fact that GST compensation is pending to all states.

"I'm also saying that it is an article of faith and we should keep up what has been coming to in terms of giving compensation to states," she said.

On rising onion prices, finance minister said prices in some places are coming down with imports of commodity.

With fresh crop coming in market, prices will furr decline, she said, adding a Group of Ministers (GoM) is regularly reviewing onion prices.

On quantum of revenue shortfall during current fiscal, Revenue Secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey said tax collection data is out till vember and advance tax numbers after December 15 will give fairly good estimate of tax mop-up. Some realistic estimate will be kwn after advance tax collection figures are out, he said.

While making a detailed presentation on state of ecomy, Chief Ecomic Adviser K V Subramanian said various measures have been taken since August to boost ecomy. se include moderation in interest rate and infusion of liquidity through various means.

Also, capitalisation of public sector banks and giving last-mile funding to realty projects was anunced.

Subramanian said following RBI guidelines mandating banks to link ir lending rates to external benchmarks, all public sector lenders have introduced repo rate linked loan products and 8.18 lakh repo linked loans amounting to Rs 72,201 crore were sanctioned till vember 27, 2019.

Besides, through MSME bill discounting, about 5 lakh bills worth Rs 12,698 crore were traded till vember 15. As part of government's initiative to clean up banking system, he said a transparent one-time settlement policy was adopted.

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