ADB to double lending to India

Asian Development Bank will double its annual assistance to over $2 billion and is expected to lend India $7.3 billion in the next three years.

Announcing this, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said the steady increase in the overall lending to India would be $2.25 billion in 2006, $2.45 billion in 2007 and $2.65 billion in 2008.

ADB, which has so far lent $14 billion to India since 1986, would be having its annual meeting in Hyderabad from May 3-6 in the wake of foreign investors evincing keen interest in the country due to booming economy.

This would be second time India would be hosting the ADB annual meeting. The first one was held in 1990 in Delhi. Over 2,000 delegates are expected to attend the Hyderabad event.

At a press conference to highlight the ADB meet, Chidambaram said India would approach both ADB and World Bank for its ambitious $1 billion project to restore 20,000 water bodies in the country.

He said India would also prepare viable big tourism projects that would attract multilateral funding. He cited development of Buddhism circuit, which has the potential to attract vast religious tourists from East Asian countries.

Chidambaram said there was some improvement in disbursement of ADB loan to India from 12 to 16 per cent in 2005 and expected it to go up to 20 per cent this year.