New Indian PM vows softer reforms, Pakistan peace

India's next prime minister laid out his vision for the world's largest democracy yesterday, vowing to help the poor and foster investment as well as secure peace with Pakistan and among Indians themselves.

"There are a lot of challenges ahead of us," Manmohan Singh said at his first news conference since President Abdul Kalam asked him on Wednesday to form a government. "The priority... will be to do everything needed to wage the battle against poverty."

Mr Singh's moderate roadmap offered a little something for everyone, but especially for the poor. Voters this month threw out the government headed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for failing to pass on the benefits of India's economic boom.

His broadbrush plan largely follows the reforms he initiated as finance minister in the early 1990s, later taken up by the BJP-led coalition ousted in an election last week.

But promising change with a human touch, Mr Singh softened the BJP's privatisation programme, pledging not to sell state banks or energy giants Oil and Natural Gas Corp and GAIL India - two of the former government's "nine gems", or cash cows.

"We need reforms and we will push forward reforms, but reforms with a human face - those reforms that provide relief, a ray of hope to India's common people," he said.

Mr Singh said his Congress party-led secular coalition, expected to take power tomorrow, would also foster a pro-investment climate, which in turn required securing lasting peace with nuclear rival Pakistan.

"We must find ways and means to resolve all outstanding problems that have been a source of friction and the unfortunate history of our relations with Pakistan," said Mr Singh, born in what is now Pakistan. "We should look to the future with hope."

The two sides are due to meet in Delhi next week. Mr Singh, a Sikh who will be India's first non-Hindu prime minister, also said his coalition would talk with separatists in Kashmir.