Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman urges India Inc to wait & watch

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday assured India Inc of full government support to overcome the impact of the pandemic while commending the Indian industry for its extreme forbearance, patience and perseverance.

Sitharaman made these remarks in two separate virtual interactions with industry captains, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and Ficci.

“I am sure all of us together will understand how best to now ramp up and sustain the growth momentum, which all of us are keen to see between the last quarter and this quarter,” she said.


The finance minister noted that the government has extended the Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECGLS 2.0) for sectors like hospitality, aviation, travel, tourism and hotels faced great difficulty since the start of the pandemic.

She assured the industry that the government is taking all measures to deal with the second wave of the pandemic and urged them to wait and watch for the next few days to assess the situation.

Sitharaman also assured seamless supply of medical oxygen to states. “Measures that the government is taking include importing medical oxygen, round the clock working of the oxygen filling stations and allowing containers used for nitrogen and argon to be used for oxygen,” she said.

The finance minister emphasised on the need for adopting micro containment strategy to deal with the pandemic and noted that, “unlike last time we now have important tools such as vaccines and medicines”.

She said the government is taking steps to help ramp up capacity of Remdesivir to 7.8 million vials per month from 3.6 million vials now.

“Some of these measures include rapid clearances for new capacities, stopping exports, stopping the exports of APIs and formulations used in the manufacture of this life saving drug, and allowing EoUs and manufacturers located in SEZs to also sell in the domestic market,” she said.

The finance minister promised to look into suggestions made by the industry towards mitigating the impact to the economy to save livelihoods alongside lives.

Uday Kotak, CII president and managing director of Kotak Mahindra Bank, emphasised on ramping up research to identify and tackle the new mutants and to upgrade the vaccines. He also suggested building India’s capacity in terms of supplies and medical infrastructure to address any possible future waves.

Uday Shankar, president of Ficci, said some clarity may be needed over essential and non-essential supply of goods, and stressed on the need to support the MSME sector which is currently facing difficulty.