New Delhi: With about three weeks left for Union Budget 2018-19, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet leading economists and sectoral experts at Niti Aayog on January 10 to deliberate on steps which could be taken to boost growth and generate employment.

 

The meeting, according to a senior government official, will be attended by vice chairman and members of Niti Aayog, members of Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM), economists and sectoral experts.

 

The meeting comes in the backdrop of latest estimates of national income by Central Statistics Office (CSO) which showed that India's growth is expected to slow down to four- year low of 6.5 per cent this fiscal, the lowest under the Modi-led government.

 

The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was 7.1 per cent in 2016-17 and 8 per cent in the preceding year. It was 7.5 per cent in 2014-15.

 

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will present Union Budget on February 1, the last full (rpt) full budget of the NDA government before the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

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Kottayam(Kerala) (PTI): A 33-year-old man climbed onto a parked truck carrying cooking gas cylinders and set fire to one of them near Thalayolaparambu in the small hours of Saturday, police said.

The incident occurred around 12.30 am, they said.

The fire and rescue personnel soon arrived at the scene and extinguished the fire, averting a major disaster.

According to police, the man is suspected to be under mental distress as he claimed that he was walking from Ernakulam to his home in Marangattupilly here when he saw the truck on the roadside.

An FIR under sections 329(3)(criminal trespass),324(2)(mischief),326(f)(mischief by injury, inundation, fire or explosive substance) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita was lodged against him.

Police said that the man was formally arrested, but will be released on station bail as the offences he is accused of are bailable.

"His family is here at the station and he will be released to them," the officer said.

In the FIR, police have said that the man opened the seal of one of the gas cylinders and set fire to it with the knowledge that his act was dangerous to those living in the area.

According to the company transporting the cooking gas cylinders, it suffered a loss of Rs 2,300 in the incident.