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Vibrant Gujarat country's main economic summit: Jaitley

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IANS Gandhinagar

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley Sunday said the Vibrant Gujarat Global Investors Summit had become the country's main economic summit while encouraging other states to organise events of similar kind.

"Today, many other states have adopted this approach. The government of India is committed to supporting any such initiative of any state government," Jaitley said in his speech at the summit here.

Later talking to reporters, he said: "I think this has become the principle economic summit as far as India is concerned. Now I think this is where economic activity is happening."

"The more the states organise it, the more their idiom and their attitude in support of investment change. It's a welcome phenomenon," he added.

 

He said recent trends of states like Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal holding such summits was very heartening.

Addressing the session on corporate social responsibility, Jaitley said there is massive inequality in society that is visible through things like lack of access to clean drinking water and toilets, even though there is a widespread notion that the country is growing.

"Even though we're growing, there's a huge amount of inequality," he said.

Pointing out that before the Jan Dhan financial inclusion scheme, only 58 percent people had bank accounts, he said the scheme had reached 11 crore people, while transfer of funds into the accounts has started from Jan 1.

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First Published: Jan 11 2015 | 10:12 PM IST

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