Indian economy performs well: IMF official

NEW DELHI, Oct. 12 (Xinhua) -- Even as the global financial meltdown continues to spread like a contagion across shores wrecking economies and financial institutions, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has projected its impact on India as minimal, the Hindu reported Sunday.

At a press conference on the World Economic Outlook in Washington earlier this week, IMF's Economic Counselor and Director (Research Department) Oliver Blanchard said that the Indian economy would continue to do well despite the impact of theglobal liquidity crunch.

"We don't see a major drag from this impact on the country. Overall, we see the Indian economy continuing to perform well," hesaid.

As per the projections made by the IMF, India is expected to post a GDP growth of 7.9 percent during the current fiscal. Mr. Blanchard pointed out that like all other countries, India to would be affected by the global slowdown.

"We are projecting that the growth in India will come down from8 percent in 2008 to 7 percent in 2009. But 7 percent is still a strong rate of growth," he said. At a time when global economies are on a downhill owing to the financial turmoil, a 7 percent growth would be a reflection of India's internal growth dynamics.



As for the specific reasons for the comparatively mild impact on the country's economy, Mr. Blanchard said: "that reflects the fact that India is still largely a closed economy, has strong internal growth dynamics, from rapid productive growth, from its process of integration into the global economy that is still continuing."