CII seeks simpler laws to curb corruption

CII was of the view that corruption could dampen the spirit of domestic and foreign investment flow into the country if it not contained.

“If there are doubts about the governance mechanism of the country,the people will always have doubts about putting their money (into the country),” said Muthuraman who visited Chandigarh after a gap of 22 years.

Emphasising that governance in terms of transparency was one of the most important agendas of the CII this year,Muthuraman,who is the Vice-Chairman of Tata Steel,said that CII was evolving a code of conduct for its company members to ensure dealing with governments in a transparent manner.

“We are evolving some code of conduct for CII members companies. We want to make sure that when we go to government we have enacted enough things to become more transparent and clean,” he said.

CII committee on integrity and transparency in governance is chaired by Adi Godrej.

Talking about the economic growth,Muthuraman said the country’s growth would slow down this year because of high inflation,rising oil prices and commodity prices.

“I expect the growth this year will slow down,investments are slowing down,margins are getting squeezed over last six months. So we must expect slowing down of economy compared to last year. We will probably have growth in the region of 8 to 8.5 per cent this fiscal,” he said.

CII President called for more efforts to contain inflation. “Inflation can be better contained by increasing supply side,making more investments into supply side,” he said.

Emphasising on the importance of inclusive growth,Muthuraman said affirmative action and skill development would be the key focus areas of CII ‘s work in the year 2011-12.

He informed that 50,000 SC/ST youth would be trained and an equal number of employment opportunities would be facilitated in the year 2011-12.

The CII President also announced creation of 4 new CII skill development hubs and setting up of 30 new district level skill centres,of which 5 would be in northern region.

CII President also announced setting up of CII- State Government task forces to work on improving investment climate saying local laws and procedures in some states create regulatory hassles and inhibit investments.

He announced that this year the trade body will have task forces with six states which would be scaled up to cover other states in the coming years.