The logic of outsourcing of jobs from countries like the United States to countries like India is irreversible in this age of globalisation, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh has said.

"The logic of it is irrefutable," Singh said on Wednesday during an interview to USA Today, one of the largest circulated newspapers published from several cities in the United States.

"I'm convinced the logic of outsourcing is such that eventually it will reassert itself," he added. Singh stressed that outsourcing has now become a two-way traffic - with some jobs coming from the US to India and some flowing in the reverse direction from India to the US.

Proudly noting the economy's 8 per cent growth rate in India, he called India 'the land of tomorrow.' "I think the economy is on a roll. India is the land of tomorrow," said Singh.

Rebuffing US critics, the paper reported, Singh said that high-tech jobs would continue to move from the US to India because the savings make it unavoidable. Amid a so-called jobless recovery in the US, the paper notes, Democratic Presidential contender Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts has slammed corporations transferring jobs to India and China as 'Benedict Arnold' companies (after the traitor to the American revolution against the British) and called for efforts to discourage additional shifts.

In recent weeks as the debate flared, some US companies involved in moving work abroad, or 'offshoring,' grew skittish about being publicly linked to the practice.

India, where operating call centers or writing software costs a fraction of what they do in the US, said the paper, has become a magnet for high-tech jobs. Companies under pressure to cut costs have shifted thousands of information technology jobs to the well-developed technology industry, centered around Bangalore.

Supporters of offshoring say it benefits the US economy because companies invest the sizable savings in other job-creating activities, far outweighing the number of jobs lost.

The number of positions affected is only a sliver of the labour force of 138 million, in the US, they argue. Amid the furore over job relocation, the Indian economy is growing at a robust 8 per cent annual rate.

Singh said that while many low-end technology jobs were moving to India, at the 'upper end,' many were moving from India to the USA. "India, too, is outsourcing. So many things are being outsourced in high technology, certain aspects of research," he said. "It is now a two-way traffic. It is not a one-way traffic."

India, the paper points out, is preparing for national elections next month. Singh refused to comment on statements by Kerry, now the apparent Democratic nominee, supporting tax code changes that would discourage companies from relocating jobs to other countries.

But the minister, clearly hoping that tempers will cool after the November US Presidential election, suggested that any protectionist moves are doomed. "If we are moving into a globalised world, we won't be able to keep these doors shut for too long," he said.