After assuming the charge, the Finance Minister was briefed on the key initiatives and policy issues by the Secretaries of the different departments of the Ministry of Finance.

The Finance Minister also held a meeting with the senior officials of the Ministry to have a first hand information regarding the ongoing issues and the forthcoming challenges facing the Indian economy among others.

During his brief media interaction, Jaitely said that his priorities would be to tackle inflation, boost economic growth and follow the path of fiscal consolidation among others.

Later, Jaitley took over as Defence Minister. On his arrival at the Ministry of Defence in South Block, Jaitley was received by Defence Secretary RK Mathur and other senior officials.

After taking over as the Defence Minister, Jaitley outlined the priority areas of the government. He said “Security of India is a matter of prime importance and predominantly the external security of India is the responsibility of this Ministry”. For this he stated that “preparedness and support to our Armed Forces and speeding up all equipment required for their support are going to be the priority areas as far as our government is concerned”. He also remarked that over the last few years some of the areas in the Ministry had slowed down and therefore, expediting them will be a matter of top priority.

Replying to a question of enhancing the FDI limit beyond the existing 26 percent, he said, this is an issue which will be dealt with by his two Ministries and added that it has already come up in his preliminary discussions in the Finance Ministry.