The British government is set to cut millions of pounds in aid to India by the end of this year as the two countries develop "a new kind of relationship" centered around "technical assistance", an official said today.
Statistics released by the Department for International Development (DfID) said that India received 279 million pounds in 2014, a 10-million pound increase over the previous year.
"We are doing exactly what we said we would do back in 2012 - ending financial aid to India by the end of this year. Since 2011, DfId has cut aid to India by almost 40 per cent, saving the British taxpayer more than 300 million pound," a DfID spokesperson said.
While financial aid will come to an end, the UK will continue to offer grants and technical assistance to India from 2016.
This, however, has sparked anger in some quarters in the UK.
Jonathan Isaby, chief executive of the UK's TaxPayers' Alliance, said: "British taxpayers will be staggered that their money is being used to support projects in a country that can well afford to look after its own citizens, especially since we have been told aid to India would be scaled back."
UK international development secretary Justine Greening had announced three years ago that Britain's aid to India would end by the end of 2015, as the two countries developed "a new kind of relationship".
"We have agreed that the UK's programme of financial grant aid to India will end. We will finish existing financial grant projects responsibly, so that they all complete as planned by 2015," she had said.
The latest figures revealed that Britain's overall aid spending has risen to 11.7 billion pound and that it now spends most of its aid money on a fund to tackle climate change.
