DHAKA: The Modi government is committed to lower taxes, India’s finance minister Arun Jaitley told The Times of India in his first interview to a newspaper after the Budget.

It was an article of faith with him as well as the prime minister that lower taxes gave people money to spend which, in turn, fuelled economic growth, he said.

In this context, he clarified that the ‘bitter pill’ referred to by Modi didn’t mean higher taxes. The rub could lie, he said, in people being asked to pay more for utilities.

He said, ‘Bitter pill could mean that for utilities the user will pay for what they use. Unless users pay, utilities can’t survive’.

This could mean higher electricity charges as well as a cut in subsidies.

Jaitley spoke at length on the Budget’s direction. Indicating that the government would shun grandstanding on reforms and avoid political confrontations, he said he hadn’t gone for ‘bold’ announcements that later came unstuck and had instead pushed for reviving the manufacturing, real estate and tourism sectors.

He added that he had retained the UPA government’s disinvestment policy as well as its social sector schemes and hoped to get its support for this.

The minister said while interest rates were the domain of the RBI, he hoped they would come down when inflation dropped as that would spur greater spending on housing.

The sector has been hit by delayed projects and mounting inventory in the wake of the severe economic slowdown and high interest rates, he said.

BDST: 1550 HRS, JUL 15, 2014