Want to grow? Curb corruption, WB tells India

India's rapid economic growth is at the risk of tripping if the country does not curb corruption and enforce rule of law, the World Bank has warned in a report.

The world's second most populous nation ranks 47th in a list of 213 countries measured for their quality of governance in a new World Bank report - Governance Matters 2006: Worldwide Governance Indicators.

World Bank Global Governance Director Daniel Kaufmann, who termed the ranking as "not in the right zone," said that the country must "pay priority to these issues" to maintain its rapid GDP growth.

Neighbouring China, with whom India is often compared to, ranked 31 in the list of the corrupt nations and prompted Kaufmann to warn that "a country could get away in the short term, and that short term could be 10 years."

The rankings were arrived at based on measurement of six facets of governance -- voice and accountability, political stability, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law and control of corruption.

In political stability, India was ranked 22, voice and accountability (56).

As regards regulatory quality, it scored 44th percentile, which means 66 per cent of the countries have better regulatory systems in place than India.

Also, the report found that some developing nations like Slovenia, Botswana and Estonia score higher in enforcing rule of law and controlling corruption than some industrialized nations like Greece and Italy.