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Growth rate of over 6 per cent will be maintained: Sinha

Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha on Thursday made a frontal attack on the prophets of doom who were forecasting a slowdown of the Indian economy and asserted that a growth rate of over 6 per cent will be maintained this year.

''Others (countries ) are confident, the world is confident, but we are not confident'' Sinha remarked when asked whether India will sustain its growth rate in the face of the slowdown of the US economy.

He did not anticipate any serious impact on the Indian economy due to the US slow down, Sinha told reporters on his return to New Delhi from the US after attending the annual International Monetary Fund-World Bank meetings.

Noting that the US's annualised growth rate had stood at two per cent instead of an abysmal 1one per cent forecast earlier, Sinha said this would have 'very minimal' impact on the Indian economy.

It was regrettable, he said, that while people abroad were very buoyant about Indian economy, the same did not hold good within the country where certain quarters remained pessimistic about the economic outlook for India.

Sinha declined to comment on the US decision to put India on the watch list under Super 301, saying it was for the commerce ministry to react.

The US government had on Tuesday announced it was placing India, EU, Japan and some other countries on the watchlist of Super 301 and Special 301 provisions of its trade law for imposing 'unfair' trade barriers on Amercian products or for violation of intellectual property rights.

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