Assuring Korean firms that their investments in India would be protected, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday called upon Korean companies to invest more in India.
Speaking at the India Korea Business Summit, organised by the DIPP and CII, Mr. Modi said, “India offers a lot of potential for the Korean investors with its huge market and enabling policy environment.”
FDI inflows
Korea ranks 16th in terms of FDI equity inflows to India with investments of $2.26 billion between March 2000 and April 2017. Mr. Modi added that the bilateral trade between India and Korea crossed $20 billion last year – for the first time in six years.
More than 500 Korean companies, including Samsung, LG and Hyundai, have operations in India.
Speaking at the same summit later in the day, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said Indian economy had the potential to achieve a growth rate of more than 7-8%.
Responding to a query, the Minister further said it was not possible to have one GST rate as the country had vast disparities. However, he assured investors that the government would undertake further reforms after improvement in tax compliance standards.
Tax compliance
The next stage of reforms would start once India became a significant tax compliant society, he said.
“For example, we have two standard rates and in the long run I do see them merging into one. For that to happen, it will take some reasonable time that is when the compliance levels start moving up,” the Minister said.
