WHILE speaking at USIBC-FICCI Round Table Meeting at Metropolitan Club in New York, USA yesterday, the Indian Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, said that India-USA economic relations are getting stronger and are more robust than they were a decade ago. At the core of the Economic and Financial Partnership launched last year is the well grounded recognition to generate common response through convergence of each other's strengths in the field of innovation and technology, he added.

Mr Mukherjee said that the US is the largest source of technical collaboration for Indian companies. There is tremendous potential for closer collaboration between educational institutions of the two countries and what is required is a jointly forged key to unlock this potential. There are at least 100,000 Indian students in US universities today. He further stated that as India moves ahead with the educational reforms envisaging expansion and up gradation of the educational infrastructure, US universities can actively engage in India.

The Finance Minister said that India's economic partnership with the United States is built on a strong framework, based on mutual benefit. Today, the US is one of our leading trade partners and a major source of investment. He said that high growth in India would continue to deliver positive spillover effect for the US. Between 2002 and 2009, US exports to India have quadrupled and the US services tripled. Last year, US-India trade in goods witnessed a 17 per cent growth. Currently, India is only the 12th largest trading partner of the US. So, there is a long way forward in moving together for harvesting mutual benefits, he added.