New Delhi (PTI): Reflecting the changed political alignment, the Economic Survey on Thursday sought radical financial reforms and tax cuts, accelerated disinvestment and freeing of oil and fertiliser prices to stimulate the economy.

Laying the roadmap ahead of the Budget, it prescribed elimination of all cesses and surcharges, including Fringe Benefit Tax, a new Income Tax Code, 49 per cent FDI in insurance and defence sectors and ending the state monopoly in running trains, nuclear plants and coal mining.

Free from the pressures of the Left parties that it faced in the last five years, the Manmohan Singh government has already announced high priority for financial sector reforms and disinvestment, which according to the Survey should have a target of mobilising Rs 25,000 crore annually.

The Survey, presented by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in Parliament, also suggested that government allow FDI in multi-brand retail and raise foreign direct investment in insurance and banking.

Stating that the worst of the global meltdown was behind, the Survey, presented in Parliament, said that a growth of up to 7.5 per cent was possible during the current fiscal but cautioned that financial investors could be manipulating global oil and commodity prices.

The economy grew by 6.7 per cent in 2008-09, pulled down by slower expansion of 5.8 per cent in the second half of the fiscal in the face of the global crisis.