Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said India received over $230 billion foreign direct investment (FDI) in the last three financial years mostly in the areas of building physical infrastructure and removing logistic bottlenecks.
“Interest of companies to get invested in India and to run businesses here is now very clearly pronounced,” Sitharaman said while addressing the 55th foundation day celebration of the Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI).
Giving details about the FDI received in the country in the recent years, the finance minister said: “Most of these investments are coming into physical infrastructure building, most of them are going into removing logistic bottlenecks, improving regional connectivity, increasing port and air capacity and increasing overall efficiencies.”
She said decisions taken by the government to make doing business easier have helped in attracting overseas investments in the country.
According to the minister, 39,000 “unnecessary compliances” have been removed while over 1,500 laws have been revoked during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s tenure to make doing business easier.
Sitharaman underlined the steps taken by the government like decriminalisation of minor offences, introduction of Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, simplification of regulatory framework and tax reforms.
She said the government has taken several steps to improve ease of doing business. “So that this country is seen for entrepreneurs and their spirit for performing for the country rather than what we had been known earlier for not so good corporate governance and inefficiencies in practice,” she added.
As per the government data, India received the highest ever annual FDI inflow of $83.57 billion in the financial year 2021-22. However, it fell to $71 billion 2022-23. During the financial year 2020-21, the gross FDI inflows to India stood at $81.97 billion.