Obama campaign accuses Romney of outsourcing jobs to India

Washington, May 4: The Obama campaign has stoked a controversy with its new ad accusing presumptive Republican presidential nominee

of outsourcing jobs to India when he was the Massachusetts governor, contrary to the

President's stand during his maiden visit to

.

"What about Mitt Romney? As a corporate CEO, he shipped American jobs to places like Mexico and China. As governor, he outsourced state jobs to a call center in India. He's still pushing tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas," said the advertisement which will run in the key states of Virginia, Ohio and Iowa.

"It's just what you'd expect from a guy who had a Swiss Bank account," says the advertisement which is approved by President Barack Obama, who is seeking his reelection this November.

The Obama campaign is believed to be spending about USD 780,000 on running this ad in these key states, reports said.

The Indian IT software and services companies get about 60 per cent of their revenues from the US market, as American firms outsource their back office jobs to India and other countries to cut cost.

On his trip to India in 2010, Obama had said, "...when I go back to the US, a part of the reason that I advertised these 50,000 jobs is I want to be able to say to the American people when they ask me why are you spending time with India when they are taking our jobs.

"I want to be able to say they actually created 50,000 jobs and that's why we should not be resorting to protectionist measures.

"We should not be thinking that it's just a one-way street. I want both the citizens of the US and India to understand the ties between the two countries."

PTI