LD G20 2 LST

Singh is leading a high-powered delegation to the
Summit which includes Planning Commission Deputy Chairman
Montek Singh Ahluwalia, National Security Adviser Shiv Shankar
Menon, Finance Secretary Ashok Chawla and Foreign Secretary
Nirupama Rao.
The Prime Minister's remarks assume significance in
the context of excessive caution being adopted by countries in
Europe who have started slashing their public spending budgets
fearing sovereign debt crisis as evidenced by the Greek
crisis.
Countries like France and Germany are pushing for a
universal tax to fund bail out of banks while the US, still
not not able to create adequate jobs, is in favour of
continuance of stimulus agreed in London last year.
India is opposed to taxing the banks and favours a
slow and calibrated exit from the stimulus.
The Prime Minister also said India hopes to return to
an ambitious 9 per cent growth by 2011-12 and to halve the
fiscal deficit in the next three years.
He told the world leaders that his government was
taking steps to reverse the fiscal stimulus introduced to deal
with the 2008 crisis. He explained how India was handling the
current economic situation.
After a day of riots, rarely seen in Canada, by
protesters opposing the USD 1 billion spent on the Summit,
host Prime Minister Stephen Harper opened the deliberations
urging the world leaders to agree to halve their deficits by
2013 and put debt-to-GDP ratio on a downward trend starting in
2016.
The anti-G20 protesters broke window panes of shops
and banks and set on fire a couple of police cars while
clashing with riot police.
Meeting against the backdrop of the sovereign debt
crisis in European countries, Harper said such a cutting down
on spending would instill confidence in markets and among
taxpayers after Greece's budget woes spakred a crisis across
Europe and forced policy makers there to pool nearly USD 1
trillion for a rescue fund. PTI VSC
RDM


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