India remains a great long-term profit play. But global investors should beware of the near-term exuberance that followed that nation’s weekend elections.

India’s information technology industry is one of the largest operations in the world – employing millions of engineers, technicians and customer service specialists who serve the world’s second-largest population.

ust a week to go now before Barack Obama finally gets his feet under the Oval Office desk. Priority #1: Getting the much-discussed economic stimulus package pushed through Congress and approved.

India’s economy has not escaped the global downturn. But growth is still much higher than the developed world. Aggressive rate cuts and a fast-growing service sector will help revive the economy. Mike Caggeso picks two deeply undervalued Indian companies with a strong potential for profits.

With its central bank’s surprise interest-rate cut on Monday, India may actually be ahead of the monetary-policy curve for the first time ever as it moves to avert a recession that Asia’s third-largest economy needs to avoid, India investing expert Karim Rahemtulla said yesterday (Tuesday).

With sky-high growth potential, China and India are the two markets no investor can afford to miss out on. But that doesn’t mean they’re impervious to market turbulence, and in times of trouble, India is the more reliable investment.

Global investors need to “hit the BRICs” – literally. Back in 2003, the Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS), eager to push its clients towards global investing – especially in the emerging markets – invented the acronym “BRIC” (Brazil, Russia, India and China) to represent the four emerging markets it believed were destined to become dominant economies in the years to come.

India’s stock market is down 23 percent this year. But it’s still one of the world’s great long-term growth plays, says Martin Hutchinson in part two of Money Morning’s special report on BRIC economies.

India is suffering high inflation, its growth is slowing and there are signs that a credit crunch is about to hit. But this can work to the advantage of investors. Without these problems, India’s stock market would be trading at 40 times earnings – and not 18 times earnings, as it is now.

Martin says that buy buying into India now, investors are likely getting in on the ground floor of a major long-term bull market.