By Arvind Padmanabhan,IANS,
New Delhi : Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia will represent India at next week’s meeting in Washington among finance ministers of world’s top 20 economies on how to regulate the global financial system in the wake of the worst economic crisis in six decades.
US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is hosting the G20 meeting April 25 to discuss what steps now need to be taken, following the decisions reached at the London summit earlier this month where the leaders agreed to pump $1.1 trillion into multilateral lending institutions.
“This time, India is going with a specific offer. Based on our voting rights, we may propose to give $10-11 billion to the International Monetary Fund (IMF),” said a senior official, adding India’s shareholding currently stood at 2 percent.
The G20 meeting coincides with the Spring-Summer meetings of the World Bank and the IMF in Washington April 25-26. It will follow a separate meeting among seven rich nations, also being hosted by Geithner April 24, officials said.
Reserve Bank of India Governor D. Subbarao will be attending the Spring-Summer meetings.
At the G20 summit in London, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was assured that developing countries like India will have higher voting rights in institutions such as IMF and the World Bank.
Leaders at the G20 pledged the $1.1 trillion package alongside measures for a tighter regulation of the international financial system to help bring the world out of recession. The measures were also designed to prevent future shocks.
They had further agreed to another major Indian demand by deciding to sell IMF gold reserves to raise $6 billion to help the world’s poorest countries with cheap loans over the next two to three years.
Besides India, Britain and the US, the G20 comprises Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey and the EU.
These countries collectively account for 90 percent of the global economic output and two-thirds of the world population.