India's finance minister promised Monday to open the country's retail trade and mining sectors to foreign investment despite persistent opposition from communist allies, saying India needed to learn from China. Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, who presented the annual federal budget to Parliament, urged lawmakers to "take a pragmatic view" and see how China had greatly benefited from liberal policies on foreign capital. China has received US$500 billion (¤379.79 billion) in foreign investment since it started opening its economy in the 1980s _ as much as US$60 billion (¤45.58 billion) just in 2004. India received less than US$4 billion (¤3.04 billion) last year. "Our own experience has been that automobiles, software, telecommunications and electronic sectors have benefited from (foreign direct investment) and have assimilated themselves into the global production chain," Chidambaram said. "I believe there are opportunities in other sectors as well such as mining, (retail) trade and pensions," he said. The government will "come forward with suitable proposals, and when we do I hope we can take a leaf out of the book of China." Chidambaram's comments came days after the government's annual report card on the economy also urged easing on foreign investment rules and slashing customs duties to make India globally more competitive. The 5.14 trillion-rupee (US$115 billion; ¤87.3 billion) budget unveiled Monday also proposed a 5 percent cut in the topmost customs duty and sought to lighten the burden of individual taxpayers. Chidambaram also proposed a big jump in budget allocations for education, health care and rural development schemes.
