The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCC&I) organized 4th edition of its annual signature “India Economic Conclave 2022” on 11th February 2022 on virtual platform.

The theme of the Conclave was “Decoding $5 trillion: The Roadmap for Indian Economy”

The Conclave was curated to bring together Sectoral Experts, Leading Economists and Bankers, Policy Makers and Captains of Industry to share insights on the country’s economic realities amidst these unprecedented times.

The Opening Session, themed: “Budget 2022 and Decoding $5 trillion: The Roadmap for Indian Economy” was commenced with the formal Welcome Address by Mr. Abraham Stephanos, President, The Bengal Chamber and Managing Director, Tata Steel Downstream Products Limited.

Shri Sumit Bose, Mentor− Economic Affairs Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Former Finance & Revenue Secretary, Government of India, during his opening remarks, suggested that the tax rates may be made more progressive, with the richer groups being taxed more as compared to the poorer segments of the population. With regard to encouraging more exports and imports, custom duties must be reduced further. The country should focus must be made for quality and value− added exports. In all segments of the economy be it agriculture, manufacturing or services, investments must be made in Research & Development so that the besides reducing costs and emissions, the overall quality of the product also improves.

The Chamber was delighted to have Shri Tarun Bajaj, IAS, Secretary, Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Government of India as Chief Guest and Mr. David Rasquinha, Former Managing Director, India Exim Bank as Guest of Honour.

Dr. Ajitava Ray Chaudhuri, Chairperson, Economic Affairs Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Professor of Economics & Former Head and Coordinator, Centre for Advanced Studies, Department of Economics, Jadavpur University delivered the formal Vote of Thanks.

Experts Roundtable on “Can the Indian Manufacturing Industry Capitalize on the current disruption in the world economy”: Shri Arun Misra, CEO, Hindustan Zinc graced the session as our Guest of Honour along with Mr. Sandeep Kumar, Managing Director, Tata Metaliks and Chairperson, Metals Committee, The Bengal Chamber. Mr. Subir Chakraborty, President Designate, The Bengal Chamber and Managing Director, Exide Industries Ltd. moderated the session. The Session highlighted how India can utilize the opportunities that have arosed from the global disruptions caused by covid. In order to capitalize the situation, the PM GATISHAKTI scheme aims to build the necessary infrastructure that is needed for India to become the manufacturing hub of the world. The PLI schemes are starting to play out and provide returns. The regulatory and compliance environment has been improved and there are some concerns with regard to this. The right value−added chains must be identified and should export those in which we possess a comparative advantage. Indian exports cannot do well unless we have regional agreements and provide markets to our exports. This is another area where the Government needs to focus on. Technological up gradation is very much important. The Micro, Small and Medium scale Enterprises (MSMEs) has huge potential in India but they are somewhat lagging behind. They must be strengthened by providing more capacity, skills and technology. Finally, not everything can be handled by the Central Government. The State Governments too need to play an important role through different actions, including Governance.

Shri Sumit Deb, Chairman & Managing Director, NMDC Ltd. graced the Fireside Chat: “India’s Decade: Defining the right trajectory for economic growth” as our Guest of Honour. The Session was moderated by Dr. Ajitava Ray Chaudhuri, Chairperson, Economic Affairs Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Professor of Economics & Former Head and Coordinator, Centre for Advanced Studies, Department of Economics, Jadavpur University. The session focused on the aspect of economic growth through mining industry. The country should focus more on exploration and unified policies. Also, as far as mining in concerned, the economic goals of the country must be balanced with the goals of the environment. The communities living around the mines must be involved in the mining process, leading to an inclusive growth.

Experts Roundtable on “Indian Service Sector : Preparedness for the Economy of Future”− addressed by Mr. Arnab Basu, Vice President, The Bengal Chamber and Advisory Leader and Partner, PwC India; Mr. Simarpreet Singh, Director, JIS Group and Mr. Ajay Thakur, Head− BSE SME and Start Up, BSE Ltd. Mr. Siddhartha Sanyal, Chief Economist and Head−Research, Bandhan Bank Ltd and Member, Economic Affairs Committee, The Bengal Chamber moderated the session. The Session highlighted that the service sector is the largest contributor to India’s GDP and has huge potential. Not only the IT segments, but also the non−IT segments must be looked at and be supported. In order to do so, we need to focus on education and skill development. Again, the quality of the services is a fact of concern. Also, it has been seen that though the proportion of output has been increasing, the proportion of employment in this sector is not rising to that extent. Thus, there is a huge wealth asymmetry that continues to form within the service sector and this needs to be addressed through appropriate policies.

Shri Siraj Hussain, Former Secretary, Agriculture, Government of India, and Senior Visiting Fellow, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) graced Fireside Chat : “Indian Agriculture Sector : of the Farmers, by the Farmers and for the Farmers”. The Session was moderated by Mr. Jayanta Chakraborty, Chairperson, Agriculture & Rural Development Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Senior General Manager, Indofil Industries Limited. The Session focused on Agriculture, especially in West Bengal. The support for marketing of agricultural goods by the State continues to persist. Apart from developing the agricultural sector, the other way in which agriculture sector could be developed was by increasing the number of jobs outside the sector. This will extract the excess labour engaged in agriculture, reducing the amount of disguised unemployment. But in this context, the transition of people working in agriculture to working in other sectors require skills. It is difficult for the small and marginal farmers to acquire these skills. Thus, the Government must take initiatives to build these skills at low costs, improving the overall level of human capital in the Country.

Special Plenary Session on “Interplay of GST in the road to $5 trillion economy”− was graced by Mr. Pulak Saha, Partner− Tax and Regulatory Services, Price Waterhouse & Co. LLP, Co−Chairperson, Indirect Taxes Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Mr. Vivek Jalan, Chairperson, Fiscal Affairs Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Partner, Tax Connect Advisory Services LLP. The session highlighted that in recent times, GST has contributed a lot in improving revenue of the Governments, however, there are lot of coordination problems, be it between the States and the Centre or between the officials involved in the process of GST, continues to exist. This problem must be solved as soon as possible because this is one area where a lot of revenue is being lost.

Valedictory Session on “India’s Net-Zero Pledge: What it implies for the Indian Economy and its journey towards sustainability?” was graced by Mr. Siddharth Sharma, Group Chief Sustainability Officer, Tata Group; Dr. Runa Sarkar, Economics Group and Convenor, Centre for Development and Environment Policy (CDEP), IIM Calcutta and Mr. Sourav Daspatnaik, Managing Director, Swach Environment Pvt. Limited. Mr. Gautam Ray, Senior Vice President, The Bengal Chamber & Executive Director (HR & Admin.) − CESC Limited & President (HR) − Power Group, RPSG moderated the session. The session focused on sustainability. Industrial groups like Tata Group has taken huge steps toward sustainability and has become a role model for other companies. It was also suggested that in order to adopt the sustainable path, clean technologies need to be adopted. Managing the transition is very much important. The transitions must be in a just and fair way so that the social dimensions of sustainability are also looked into.

Dr. Shiladitya Chatterjee, Member, Economic Affairs Committee, The Bengal Chamber and Former Member Indian Administrative Service (IAS) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) delivered the concluding remarks and formal Vote of Thanks. He stated that since independence, India has been more or less doing well economically. But all these growth figure would be deemed if the actual development of the Country is not up to the mark. We know that economic growth is just a means and the end lies in sustainable, inclusive, economic development. In several aspects like health, education, economic inequality, gender inequality etc, the condition of India is not only low but much lover than the world average. Thus, along with these numeric figures, more focus must be made on improving the overall well−being of the citizens by improving their standards of living.