The economy can grow from 7.6 to 8 per cent till March 2012, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, said on Friday.
“At 7.6 per cent, the economy is growing faster than any economy in the world. Our objective should not be to worry about the fact that it has slowed down, but how to make it grow at 8 per cent plus next year,” said Mr Ahluwalia on the sidelines of a FICCI event here.
Dismissing claims of Indian industry that the Reserve Bank's tightening of the monetary policy was affecting industrial output growth, Mr Ahluwalia said, “The interest rate today is roughly what it was when the economy was growing at 9 per cent. I would not draw any connection between the two.”
Mr Ahluwalia said he was happy with Standard & Poor's ratings of the banking sector that offset Moody's downgrade of the sector earlier.
“Our's is a very well-regulated banking sector and there was no justification whatsoever for raising questions on the financial stability of the banking sector,” Mr Ahluwalia said on Moody's ratings.
S&P upgraded the risk profile (BICRA) to Group 5 on Thursday. A day before, global rival Moody's had downgraded the outlook of the Indian banking system to ‘negative' from ‘stable'.