World Bank President on a two-day visit to India

NEW DELHI: World Bank President James D Wolfensohn will begin his two-day India visit on Wednesday to monitor the bank-funded schemes and discuss with government officials ways to step up lending to the country.

Wolfensohn will be visiting the World Bank-supported ''Diversified Agricultural Support Project'' in Uttar Pradesh and the ''Education for All Project'' site in Delhi on Thursday.

The World Bank chief will be accompanied by his wife Elaine Wolfensohn, who will visit the education project with him. She will also visit an AIDS project site on the same day.

The World Bank is organising a seminar here tomorrow, where Wolfensohn will address on ''India: Opportunity and Challenge in a Globalised World''.

Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and World Bank Vice President for South Asia region, Praful Patel, will also address the seminar.

Wolfensohn is also slated to meet senior government officials during his visit.

The World Bank President''s India visit assumes importance in the wake of Finance Minister P Chidambaram''s recent deliberations on the need to step up multilateral aid to developing nations at the IMF-World Bank meeting in Washington last month.

The World Bank has already agreed to double its assistance to India to $3.0 billion from this year.