Arvind Subramanian new chief economic advisor

The Narendra Modi government Thursday appointed US-based economist Arvind Subramanian as the chief economic advisor in the finance ministry, filling a key position that has been lying vacant for over a year.

Soon after assuming charge, Subramanian said he would focus on growth, investment and creating opportunities for all sections of Indian society.

"For any economy like India, the two big things are macro economic stability and of course creating conditions for rapid investment and growth. While creating opportunity for all segments of Indian society, no one should be left out of this process," he told media persons outside his office.

"It is an absolute honour and privilege to come at this time, a time of great hope and dynamism for the economy, to serve in the government that has a mandate for reform and change," he added.

Educated at St. Stephens College and IIM Ahmedabad, Subramanian is the senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and at the Center for Global Development, both based in Washington, the finance ministry said in a statement here.

He is currently ranked amongst the top one percent of the world's economists in terms of citation of research as per a widely used ranking system, it added.

The post has been lying vacant since Raghuram Rajan became the Reserve Bank of India governor in September last year.

Subramanian, who has worked closely with Rajan in the past, was assistant director in the research department of the International Monetary Fund and was associated with the GATT (1988-92) during the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations.

Subramanian's award-winning book "Eclipse: Living in the Shadow of China's Economic Dominance" was published in September 2011 and Foreign Policy magazine named him as one of the world's top 100 global thinkers in 2011," the statement said.