Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Friday said keeping inflation rate low, not high growth, was a priority for the government.

His statement comes amid fear that a possible recession in the US can affect economies of developing countries, including India.the finance minister was confident that the US economy would not move towards recession and would bounce back.

Controlling prices will be a higher priority than high growth for Finance Minister P Chidambaram, who today said that he will be sunk if he aimed for high growth and high inflation.

Clearly spelling out that the priority of the Indian government is to maintain low inflation below four per cent and reasonably high growth rate, Chidambaram, however, cautioned that exporters may be supported affected by slow down in the US economy.

“Between inflation and growth, what hurts the poor most is the inflation. That is why we must keep inflation low and this means reasonably high rate of growth,” he said.

India’s wholesale prices-based inflation rate grew by 3.83 per cent for the week ended January 12 compared to 3.79 per cent in the previous week, but was still under the Reserve Bank’s target of under 5 per cent for the fiscal.