India's bilateral investment restrictive: Panagariya

The Dollar Business Bureau

The bilateral investment agreements of India come out to be ‘restrictive’ whereas China is emerging as a key player when it comes to foreign investments, said Arvind Panagariya, Vice-Chairman, Niti Aayog on Tuesday. 

“China is now emerging as a provider of outward investment. It is looking out to set rules for outward investment...Our own bilateral investment treaty happens to be rather restrictive," Panagariya said while speaking at the International G20 Conference organised by ICRIER in New Delhi. 

As per the data by Chinese government, during the January-April 2016 period, the Chinese investors had done direct overseas investment in 3,434 entities of 150 nations and regions. The direct overseas investment valued to RMB 391.45 billion (about $60.08 billion, an increase of 71.8 percent year-on-year).

In December 2015, the Indian government had cleared the revised model text for the Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) in order to enhance the protection of international investors in the country and also Indian investments overseas, but matters related to taxation will still be out of its purview. 

Providing details about the matters to be discussed in the upcoming meet of G20 to be held in September in China, Panagariya stated that five sessions are likely to be held at leaders’ level. 

The agenda of the first session will be growth and G20 Presidency of China with the inclusion of investment as a new aspect, he informed. 

In addition, the other matters that would be discussed in the meet are refugee crisis, terrorism financing, and climate change and climate financing, he said.

Issues related to the job market and also those related to development of agriculture would also figure at the conference, he added.