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Thursday, Mar 17, 2005

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Fortune focus on India

By K. Satyamurty

BANGALORE, MARCH 16. The International Editor of Fortune magazine, Robert Friedman, has a special reason for a long visit to India, braving the beginning of what could be a hot summer. Fortune is planning a cover story on India this October.

"India has really caught our attention and we want to get closer to India as a magazine," said the Editor of the business journal now into its 75th year of publication, having been born, ironically, during the Depression Era.

The topic for his talk to a select audience of business leaders and the media here on Wednesday was `India's Role in the Global Economy.' "Your Information Technology sector has grown, setting its own agenda and [is] not overly dependent on the Government. If other sectors can do this, India's economy could be one of the strongest some years from now," he said. The IT sector was the first to prove that India could be globally competitive and this came about after the economy opened up.

There was scope for IT to be effectively used in governance to overcome certain inherent handicaps such as the lack of internationally acceptable infrastructure, he said.

Fortune's Asia Editor, Clay Chandler said: "You have inherent strengths like being a thriving democracy with a large English-speaking population unlike China. The Free World is cheering for India to succeed." However, China was more open to foreign direct investment than India and this needed to be corrected, he said.

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