Tax issues being ‘put to sleep’, reforms in offing: Jaitley

Promising more economic liberalisation, finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Friday efforts are being made to "put to sleep" pending taxation issues to attract investments and make the fundamentals of the economy sound so that it can withstand the global turmoil.

Addressing a gathering of industry leaders at the India Economic Convention 2015, the minister said a number of taxation issues have been put to rest and the endeavour is to put to sleep the remaining ones.

Regretting that the Goods and Services Tax (GST) got stuck because of political reasons, Jaitley said, "many reforms (are) in pipeline".

 In order to promote ease of doing business, he said the government is working on areas like bankruptcy code, disputes resolution in major contracts, expeditious arbitration proceedings and a public procurement law.

"These are (reforms)... Which we are trying to put on track," Jaitley added.

Referring to the fast-changing global financial situation, the minister said, "In a situation when there is a turmoil by the day ... we are trying to make the fundamentals of our economy a little sound so that our ability to resist changes substantially increases.

"And once we are able to walk on this growth track, I am quite certain that the architecture of growth for India would be settled, strong and deep."

The minister also underlined the need for improvement in the regulatory environment, saying the regulatory system has to be prepared for a much faster change.