US offers to finance India’s infra boom

New Delhi

The US side signalled its intentions to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley during the sixth Annual Ministerial Meeting of India- US Economic and Financial Partnership (EFP) in Washington on Thursday.

“The US offered support for India’s National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF) to increase financing options for India’s infrastructure growth and expressed interest in further discussions in areas such as municipal finance,” said an official release issued on Friday.

The meeting took stock of the concerted efforts undertaken by both sides to deepen mutual understanding and to improve cooperation across a wide range of bilateral and multilateral issues. The two sides noted the significant progress made in resolving bilateral tax disputes  between the United States and India. Progress has also been made in sharing of financial information between the two countries under the Inter-Governmental Agreement, pursuant to Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA).

During the meeting, Jaitley underscored that Financial Action Task Force (FATF) must ensure effective implementation of legislation in various countries relating to terrorist financing and take concrete action against countries sponsoring terrorism and hosting terrorist infrastructure. The FATF must also address offshore tax evasion and avoidance including through tax havens, he added.

Jaitley also participated in G-20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting, BRICS Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting and BRICS New Development Bank (NDB) Board of Governors meeting.

In his interventions, the Finance Minister highlighted that even as India has consistently recorded the highest growth figures among large economies in the world for the last three quarters, global growth continues to remain sluggish and has witnessed recurring downward revisions.