While speaking at the ET India Ascends event, Nageswaran highlighted key areas for India’s economic strategy, including deregulation, support for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), and a balanced approach to market volatility.
According to Nageswaran, India’s long-term investment attractiveness hinges on “opening up our imagination and thinking in terms of global scales,” with an emphasis on unlocking untapped sectors for growth. He stressed that SMEs are pivotal to India’s ambition to become a global manufacturing hub, advocating for reforms to help small businesses evolve into medium-sized enterprises and medium ones grow into large enterprises.
Deregulation, he added, will play a major role in fostering this growth and will be a central theme in the upcoming Economic Survey. “We need to remove the fear of growth, and for that, deregulation is the answer,” he stated. With a restructured and stabilized banking sector, Nageswaran expressed optimism about India’s resilience amid global market volatility, urging a steady approach to avoid “knee-jerk reactions” to foreign investor behavior.
The CEA also highlighted the importance of managing India’s transition to non-fossil fuel energy sources while ensuring affordable access to energy, especially as emerging economies face challenges balancing economic growth with sustainability.
This strategic focus, he asserted, will help India strengthen its economic fundamentals, fostering a climate that supports steady investment and sustainable growth in a rapidly shifting global economy.