We are on Growth Track, but Power Availability is Still Needed for the Industry: Naina Lal Kidwai

Business graduate from Harvard Business School graduate and a symbol for women entrepreneurship, Padma Shree Naina Lal Kidwai needs no introduction. Recognized world over with several prestigious awards in business and ranked several times in the Fortune global list of Top Women in Business. The ex FICCI President, was featured in Wall Street Journal , Financial Times  and The Time Magazine.

In an exclusive interaction with Faiz Askari of SMEStreet, Ms Kidwai shared her views on present scenario of Indian economy and Modi Government’s strategies and focus towards bringing the much needed reforms.

The edited excerpts:

As the representative of India’s leading industry body-FICCI, what are your observations on first year of Modi Government?

Overall this government has taken some positive and much needed steps which are conceptualized to give a boost to the Indian economy. I feel that the schemes and programs which are been announced in last one year. Out of such programs, Make in India, digital India and even clean India is definitely set to enhance the livelihood of common Indians and will directly impact the Indian economy. Although, it will take some time when we start getting the results of such schemes but as an industry stakeholder I can say that we are on the right track.

What according to you, what are key result oriented areas in which Government of India is working on specially with regards to the overall betterment of the economy?

I strongly feel that government’s focus on the creation of Infrastructure, health and sanitation, enhancing the agriculture productivity through technology and ensuring the ease of doing business in India are some of the areas which will fetch great results for the overall economy. Schemes and programs in this direction are evidence of the fact that we are on right track.

What are the key areas in which government must take action in order to revive the economy?

In the last few years of the previous government, we observed a significant decline in the consumer demand side. This was mainly due to the fact that income levels of people have not grown the way they were suppose to, the inflation reached high levels and so on. All of these factors effected negatively on the spending graph. Now, the present Modi Government must have to focus on generating consumer demand. This can be achieved through a multi pronged and multi layered growth oriented strategy. This strategy should have controlling inflation, infrastructure creation, credit availability.

From the industry perspective what is the biggest need of the hour?

There are many in fact, but the availability of power is the biggest demand from Indian industry specially from the perspective of manufacturing companies. Industry wants a regular and uninterrupted supply of power for their production. Since the Make In India program is running with flying colors, availability of power holds great prominence.