Economy

The industry body welcomed the government's move a day after Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced steps to help the nearly stalled real estate sector and increase India's exports.

The shopping festivals will be in four different themes: Gold and jewellery, handicrafts/yoga/tourism, textiles and leather, an official release said.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the government would also relax external commercial borrowing guidelines for projects in the country's affordable housing scheme.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday announced a slew of measures aimed at boosting exports, including a new scheme to incentivise exporters and a higher insurance cover to banks lending for exports. Announcing easier rules for lending to priority sectors, Nirmala Sitharaman said the measures could lead to export credit rising by Rs 36,000 crore to Rs 68,000 crore. "The measures have been periodically formulated based on the inputs that we obtained during nationwide consultations that we are doing," said the Finance Minister. The steps to promote exports come at a time the government intends to more than triple the country's annual exports to $1 trillion in the next five years.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the industrial production growth has clearly improved till the end of July compared to the last quarter of financial year 2018-19.

Export sectors that recorded positive growth in the last month include iron ore, electronic goods, spices, and marine products.

The GST Council, headed by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and comprising representatives of all states and Union Territories (UTs), is scheduled to meet on September 20 in Goa amidst a clamour for a cut in tax rates from various industries to beat the slowdown in the economy.

Wholesale prices in India's largest onion trading hub, Lasalgaon in Maharashtra, have nearly doubled in a month to Rs 29,500 per tonne.

Achieving that export goal is key to making India a $5 trillion economy, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said.

The government will soon come up with a credit scheme for exporters with enhanced insurance cover up to 90%, said Piyush Goyal.

Annual retail inflation in August was slightly higher compared with 3.15 per cent in the previous month, and in line with analysts' forecasts.

Consumer inflation came in at 3.21 per cent in August, government data showed on Thursday. That marked the highest level recorded since October last year, when it had stood at 3.38 per cent. Consumer inflation or the rate of increase in consumer prices is determined by the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) tracks consumer inflation primarily while formulating its monetary policy. Separate official data showed growth in industrial production was at 4.3 per cent in July, as against 2 per cent the previous month.

Thursday's data also meant consumer inflation came in below the Reserve Bank of India's medium-term target of 4 per cent for the thirteenth month in a row.

Trade deficit during the month shrank significantly to $13.43 billion from $18.63 billion in July 2018 as imports contracted 10.43 per cent to $39.76 billion.

Talks are ongoing to negotiate the China-initiated Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), Piyush Goyal said.