India to overtake China as financial power after 2015

India will overtake China as a financial power after 2015 as its institutions can weather recession easily, a former union minister said. Speaking at a seminar on 'The Indian Economy and the China Factor' at the Swiss-India Chamber of Commerce here, Former Union Commerce Minister and Janata Party chief Subrahmanian Swamy said that India will "overtake" China after 2015.

"India, because its institutions will weather the crisis more easily," he said referring to the "1977 East Asia crisis". Swamy said that investing in an Indian business is a costly affair owing to poor infrastructure and corruption.

"But Indians now have demonstrated capacity to produce the highest quality products as proved by the global awards that it won for quality in IT software and automobile ancillary industry," he said. Swamy noted that poor infrastructure and corruption are drawbacks that can be rectified by decisive Government action.

For example, he said, Indians hold about Rs 6.5 lakh crores (USD 1.5 trillion) in Swiss banks alone which can be recovered by issuing an ordinance to nationalise all Indian citizens' accounts in Swiss banks. "The Swiss government, by the new post-Marcos legislation would then be obliged to hand over the accounts to the Indian government," he added.