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New Delhi, June 1 (IANS): In a Facebook post on Sunday after his first week in office, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley emphasised the need to contain inflation and speed up economic reforms to boost low-cost manufacturing.
"Reviving the growth momentum, containing inflation and altering the pattern of growth to gainful employment is today an overriding priority," Jaitley posted.
Retail inflation (consumer price index) was at 8.59 percent in April year-on-year, after running near or above 10 percent for almost two years through 2013.
India’s economic growth remained below the 5 percent mark for the second year running at 4.7 percent in 2013-14.
"The slowdown in economic growth coupled with high inflationary pressure poses a challenge to the macro economic environment. India can ill afford this trend. This has serious social consequences since slowdown comes with a decade of jobless growth," Jaitley said.