Chief economist of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas said on Wednesday that India has emerged as "a bright light" at a time when the world is facing imminent prospects of a recession, noting that the country, however, needed key structural reforms so as to achieve the ambitious target of being a USD 10 trillion economy.

The chief economist of the IMF noted: " I want to say, India is sort of bright light. The Indian economy has been doing reasonably well." In its World Economic Outlook on Tuesday, the IMF projected a growth rate of 6.8 percent in 2022 as compared to 8.7 percent in 2021 for India. The projection for 2023 slides down further to 6.1 percent, he noted.

Answering to a question on the ambitious goal of India becoming a USD 10 trillion economy, Gourinchas said that he certainly believes this is achievable. "I mean, we have ve seen a number of countries grow at very fast rates in the past and really develop very rapidly. So, I think it's certainly, now it is s not necessarily an easy task, but I think, yes, there is certainly an enormous potential for an economy like India," he  said in press briefing.

To do so, India needs to carry out a number of structural reforms, he observed. "Well, there are certainly a number of structural reforms that are or improvements are needed in the economy like India. There have been a number of reforms already," he said. For instance, India is very much at the forefront of digitalisation, he said.

The chief economist also appreciated India’s digitisation endeavors saying that the move was a game changer as it had permitted the Indian government to do things that would have been enormously difficult otherwise.

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