India an attractive investment destination: Anand Sharma

Indian commerce minister Anand Sharma has defended the government's decision to make retrospective amendments to the I-T Act. Sharma says that the retrospective amendment was not targetted at Vodafone, reports CNBC's Caroline Shauber.

"India still remains to be an attractive destination for foreign investments", he points out.
Anand says, "What is being seen as specific to a particular case is not correct – that is a clarificatory amendment, is not substantive, it is not related only to Vodafone. There have been other similar transactions, which were found to be taxable by the revenue authorities and other companies accepted that interpretation, other countries also had to take revenue decisions. Investment and partnership, between the country and the investor is not only restricted to tax matter, it is much bigger than that."
On being asked if, there has been an apparent standstill on the further liberalisation of the aviation and retail sector? Sharma said; “Aviation sector has been recently discussed and a considered view has been taken. In retail, we have taken a decision to allow 100% FDI in single-brand retail. When something positive is done and that should not be called as standstill or paralysis that should be acknowledged.”