Despite challenges, India aims to become land of opportunities: Min Hardeep

New Delhi: India is facing certain challenges and the government’s attempt is to convert these challenges into opportunities, Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri said on Thursday.

‘We have been able to navigate global prices. Clearly when prices are high, the situation will be inflationary,” he said while addressing the day 2 of INDIA CHEM 2022, organized by FICCI, jointly with the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers, Govt of India.

The world’s largest economy has faced negative growth along with many of the European countries which are facing very challenging times, he said.

Puri said,’ India will be affected by high petrol prices but so far we have navigated through it. The government brought down the central excise on two occasions in November ‘21 and May ‘22 even at a time when we were feeding 800 million people 3 meals of dry ration in a day.’

“We will continue to take such steps but the high energy prices, globally will result in more inflation and recession and unless it is corrected there will be pressure on the global economies,” he said.

The Minister said, “We are taking corrective measures including the new pipeline and other innovative steps like introduction of solar cooker, which in the coming months will make a major impact in lowering the demand for domestic kitchen energy because it will feed on the natural sunlight.”

Puri highlighted that the Indian economy is growing at a rate of 7 per cent, and energy is a critical driver of growth.

“Our refining capacity, which currently stands at about 252 million metric per annum, is likely to go up to about 400 million metric tons per annum in the coming years. We are also transiting from fossil fuel based energy to a greener energy including solar, wind and compressed biogas,” he added.