India is aiming to get back on higher growth trajectory of 8 per cent as it would help in generating more jobs and promoting inclusive growth, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia said here on Thursday.

“We are trying to get back to 8 per cent growth and that is good for the world. In my view the central focus should be on getting growth back”, he said during a panel discussion on policy options for job and growth organised on the sidelines of IMF-World Bank annual meetings.

Ahluwalia further said that focusing on growth does not necessarily mean ignoring job creation. “I don’t think that getting growth back would ignore jobs nor do I think that the growth that we were having was all that anti-jobs“.

India has been growing by over nine per cent before the global financial meltdown of 2008 which pulled down the growth rate to 6.7 per cent in 2008-9. The growth rate further dipped to nine-year low of 6.5 per cent in 2011-12.

The 12th Five-Year Plan (2012-17) seeks to raise the average annual growth rate to 8.2 per cent from 7.9 per cent achieved in the previous Plan.

Ahluwalia said, “We know very little about how to promote job. We should do what we are really know how to do... We know how to get growth back. I am totally in favour of restoring jobs, reducing poverty and best framework there is to first get growth back and... inclusive growth“.

From the point of view of India, he said, the aim would be to get back to the kind of growth which was possible as exports would remain subdued for several years.

“We probably have to run somewhat bigger current account deficit, so key macro challenge is to get enough money ploughing into the country as FDI, FII etc. That is what we can and that is what we should be concentrating on”, he said.

These efforts, Ahluwalia said, would also help in imparting expansionary stimulus to the global economy.

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