'PM to decide India's vote on IMF chief'

A day ahead of Mexican Central Bank Governor Agustin Carstens' visit here to seek support for his candidature for the top IMF post, the Finance Ministryon Thursday said the decision on India's vote will be taken by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

A day ahead of Mexican Central Bank Governor Agustin Carstens' visit here to seek support for his candidature for the top IMF post, the Finance Ministry on Thursday said the decision on India's vote will be taken by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

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"It (India's support) has to be decided at the Prime Minister's level. In between, we would like to see who are the candidates," Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters here when asked about India's stand on Carstens.

Earlier this week, French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde, who came calling here for India's support for her candidature, did not get any commitment from India.

Carstens, a prominent non-European candidate, would visit here as part of a campaign seeking support for his candidature for the post of Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund.

"I will talk to him (Carstens) as I talked to Christine Lagarde. I know him personally. He is a known face internationally," Mukherjee said.

On Tuesday, after meeting Lagarde, Mukherjee indicated there was no assurance on supporting her bid. "We are working on a consensus," he had said.

However, a consensus is yet to be reached on any candidate from the BRICS bloc (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa).

India has a quota of 2.34 % in the multilateral lending agency.

The post of IMF chief fell vacant after the ignominious departure of Dominique Strauss-Kahn in the wake of sexual assault charges against him.