Higher software exports and rising earnings from an industry that provides back-office services helped India's current account surplus double to $1.8 billion in the October-December quarter from a year earlier.
Data released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Thursday showed the country's balance of payments (BOP) surplus widened in the October-December quarter to $7.2 billion from a surplus of $6.1 billion in the same period a year earlier, as foreign capital inflows into Asia's third-largest economy gathered pace.
India's software service industry, a sector that includes call centres and back-office work conducted over high-speed telecoms, has been growing aggressively in recent years.
The industry's exports grossed $9.5 billion in the year to March 2003, and are expected to grow at least 26 percent in the fiscal year ended March 2004.
The central bank said a surge in software service exports, a bulk of which goes to the United States, offset the widening trade deficit as Indian manufacturers imported more to meet rising demand in an economy expected to grow at more than eight percent in the year to March 2004.
Last year, India grew by just four percent.
India expanded at a scorching double-digit 10.4 percent in the October-December period, powered by the manufacturing and farm sectors.
The central bank said the country's trade deficit widened to $5.6 billion in the October-December period from $4.4 billion a year ago, reflecting strong industrial growth amid higher demand generated by the best monsoon the farm-dependent economy has seen in a decade.
Data from the central bank on Thursday showed India's current account surplus rising to $3.2 billion in the nine months to December 31 from $2.9 billion a year ago.
India's financial year runs from April to March. It does not release seasonally adjusted data.
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