New Delhi: As the rupee falls to another record low of 96.90 against the US dollar in early trade today, as higher crude oil and food prices add to the uncertainty arising from the US-Israel war on Iran, and amid portends of a slowdown in India’s economic growth, commerce minister Piyush Goyal said a day ago that businesses should not panic and instead devise ways to strengthen their business.Speaking at Assocham’s India Business Reform Summit 2026, Goyal said, according to PTI, that present global situation and geopolitical uncertainties should be viewed as an opportunity for India,“India and Prime Minister [Narendra] Modi have never let a crisis go by and the situation in the world is truly an opportunity, a moment of uncertainty that we should engage more deeply with. Find ways to strengthen our business processes and prepare ourselves on these uncertain times for brighter and better future,” he was quoted as having said.“In such a situation, we do not need to panic,” Goyal said. He is also reported to have said that the West Asia crisis, and emerging technologies like AI bring opportunities for Indian industry to seize.As The Wire has noted, after a lavish election in Bengal, PM Modi’s appeal to citizens for austerity by consuming less oil, gold, fertilisers, foreign travel threw Indians in disarray. The stock markets crashed and the already sagging rupee has been weakening ever since.New Delhi has so far not been able to ink with Tehran a blanket arrangement for its ships to travel through the crucial Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has choked in retaliation of the US and Israel’s attacks on the country since February 28.An Economic Times report has noted that these prevalent factors, along with the likely impact of an evolving El Niño on agriculture, will drag India’s economic growth down to 6.7% in 2026-27, quoting India Ratings and Research.Gross domestic product (GDP) growth for the fourth quarter of 2025-26 is projected at 6.7%, according to Ind-Ra, whereas official estimates place it at 7.6% year-on-year.The National Statistics Office is to release provisional GDP estimates for 2025-26 and quarterly estimates for the January-March on June 5.Meanwhile, the credit-rating agency ICRA forecasts that India’s economic growth likely slowed to a three-quarter low of 7% year-on-year in Q4FY26 from 7.8% in the previous quarter.Slower expansion in the industrial and services sectors offset a slight improvement in agriculture, it said.ICRA’s forecast for FY26’s GDP growth is 7.5%, slightly lower than the NSO’s estimate of 7.6%, PTI reports.Aditi Nayar, chief economist at ICRA, is quoted in a report as having said that while growth in mining and electricity improved in Q4FY26 compared to Q3, “a slower rise in manufacturing volumes, contraction in exports, and nascent signs of margin pressure amid the West Asia fallout, may have weighed on industrial gross value added growth performance in the quarter.”