T V Narendran, the President of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) stated that the Economic Survey provides a comprehensive assessment of the Indian economy and reinforces the confidence that India can move on a path of accelerated growth. He added, “The Survey, which has been penned against the backdrop of the stress created by the Omicron wave, offers a pragmatic prognosis of the economy and the way forward.” 

Also Read | Budget 2022: When & where to watch, what to expect

Narendran also said, “The Survey rightly notes that a continuing thrust on capital expenditure, especially in areas such as infrastructure and a revival of the housing cycle would act as a key enabler to revitalize growth in the economy and take GDP growth to 8.0-8.5 per cent during FY23”. 

Also Read | Economic Survey 2021-2022: Key highlights and takeaways

He added that boosting investment and growth leads to boosting the “competitiveness of the Indian industrial sector, making it a stronger engine of economic growth.” Narendran also stated how the CII is in agreement with the Economic Survey. They concur that “reforms and other interventions of the Government such as the PLI Scheme for 13 sectors, the repeal of retrospective taxes, the changes in the public procurement policy, reforms in telecom and aviation, financial sector reforms, MSMEs among others would build trust factor among the investors and gave a fillip to industrial growth. Overall, the Survey reflects practicality in its evaluation of the economy and the road ahead”.

Also Read | Union Budget 2022: A look at India’s most historic budgets

President-Designate of CII, Sanjiv Bajaj, was also appreciative that the government had come out with this insightful document that manages to succinctly create a repository of reform and data for initiatives that the government has undertaken to meet the economic and social goals for India’s development.

Also Read | Explained: Ahead of Assembly elections, will Union Budget 2022 be in favour of farmers?

He said, “On the services side, while the Survey posits that the sector has recovered from the impact of the lockdown, it acknowledges that contact-intensive services have yet to reach optimum performance levels. CII hopes that the Budget would take steps to address the stress build-up in these sectors to rejuvenate employment-intensive growth in the economy”. 

Also Read | Pharma, Infra, Agriculture and other stocks likely to benefit from Budget 2022

Further, Bajaj added, “At the same time, the Survey recognizes that financial services have shown resilience and their performance is well above pre-Covid levels. What is significant is that the capital markets are buoyant and gross NPAs have shown a distinct reduction. Going forward, we hope that the government would continue to undertake path-breaking reforms such as privatization of PSBs which would help bring efficiency and raise productivity in the economy”.