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Former Niti Aayog Vice Chairperson Arvind Panagariya has said India is on the cusp of returning to a high growth trajectory and voiced confidence that the country will become the world’s third-largest economy by 2027-28. He said India is currently in a spot that it was in 2003 when the growth rate picked up to close to about 8 per cent and the country sustained that kind of rate for a few years. Outlining his reasons for high growth ahead, he said several reforms have been implemented and weaknesses in the economy have been cleaned up during the COVID pandemic such as non-performing assets of banks and weak balance sheets of many of the big corporates.

Noting that balance sheets of banks and corporates are now pretty sound, Panagariya said this is reflected in the investment proposals and investment commitments that are being made by many of the large corporates. He said ‘we're seeing this surge in both public and private investments, the fact that policy reforms have happened, lots of infrastructure has been built up. And the fact that there is an effective government in place, very credible (government).’

He further said India will certainly remain the fastest-growing major economy for several years to come. He projected that 'India would maintain about a 7 per cent growth rate over these years and if the country takes measures to open up the economy further, particularly on the trade front with liberalisation requiring ‘a good bit of knocking down of the customs duties’, then we could get to easily 8 per cent.' He said the rest of the strengths for achieving this growth are present in the system. Some of the reforms that are ongoing need to be implemented, for instance, the labour law reform.