New Delhi, March 24 : Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Thursday said long term steps taken by the Narendra Modi government are pushing domestic industry and informed the House that India crossed the landmark figure of $400 billion in export of goods on March 23. Replying to the demands for grants for the Commerce and Industry Ministry in Lok Sabha, Goyal said the government has come up with schemes for the development of the country, so that in future India will have the potential to be established as the strongest economic power in the world. Goyal said that today the whole world is looking towards India for investment. India has witnessed the highest foreign direct investment in the last five years. There was no shortage of foreign exchange in the country even during the Covid pandemic period. “India was in fragile five when our government took over in 2014… We made some bad decisions were takes,” Goyal said. “When Modi government came it was decided we will do structural reforms. The instruction given to us by the Prime Minister was that the whole country should be developed, there should not be imbalance in development,” he said adding that PM Modi asked to focus on areas that were lagging behind. “Yesterday for the first time, India’s goods exports figures crossed $400 billion. This is just merchandise, the figures of service export will be out soon. Agriculture exports had a major share,” he said. Responding to a point raised by some members that raids are happening in the country which is affecting investment, the Minister said Prime Minister Narendra Modi was voted in by people because he takes strong decisions. “I do not understand the relation between raids and investments…Is there any provision or law in the country that if you are a big politician or a big industrialist, action would not be taken for their wrongdoings…Action will be taken….Jo galat kaam karega wo saja bhugtega uske liye (One who does wrong will be p shed for that),” he said. The Minister also said that the high level of foreign direct investments (FDI) coming into the country reflects the growing confidence of global investors for India. “India is the destination,” he said, adding there is no better destination than India to invest. Goyal also talked about start ups and said there are more than 65,000 startups registered with the Ministry and lakhs who are yet to register. He also said 90 startups in India have attained corn status, that is, an overall valuation exceeding one billion US dollars. The demands for grants were later passed with voice vote and the cut motions were disapproved by the House. AO SHK1728