RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan today said India has a long way to catch up with China on per capita GDP and will need years of strong growth but cautioned against expanding economy at the cost of environment.

China's per capita GDP is about four times of India's, he said. "So yes, we have a long way to catch with the level of per capita GDP and that means many years of strong sustainable growth. I want to emphasise here, because a few years of growth will not help. After those few years, we have very slow growth. We need sustainable growth which is why we need systems in place, we need macro-stability in addition to the growth," he added.

Rajan was speaking at an interactive session at National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj. The per capita income in India at current prices is estimated to be Rs 93,293, as per data on Provisional Estimates of Annual National Income and Quarterly Estimates of Gross Domestic Product 2015-16.