Chief economic advisor Kaushik Basu Friday cautioned against possibility of another global economic crisis in 2014 that is likely to be caused by huge repayment of loan by European banks. He clarified that his recent comments on economic reforms getting a push after 2014 was not linked to India's general election but to a "possible European crisis".

"At the Carnegie lecture, the gist of my argument was that 2014 was an important year because numerous European banks would have to begin to repay $1.3 trillion worth of loans that they had received from the European Central Bank," Basu said in a statement.

"But soon after the possible European crisis of 2014, we could see India as the world's fastest growing economy, faster than even China," he added.

"Some of this was reported on poorly, juxtaposing my comments on Europe in 2014 with the Indian election of 2014. This is unfortunate, because the central message of my talk was the possible European crisis of 2014 and India's major rise thereafter, likely overtaking China," he said.

Basu was quoted as saying in a section of media that major economic reforms were unlikely till 2014 because of the general election.

His comment at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, in Washington Thursday, sparked a political storm in the country.

Basu said the opinion expressed by him at the meeting in Washington was his personal and it should not be seen as that of the government.

"This is one of the strengths of India that it allows us to generate and discuss new ideas without the government having to first endorse them," he said.

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's top advisor admitted that there was slowdown in economic reforms and decision-making in recent years due to coalition politics.

"I specifically mentioned that the problem with the Goods and Services Tax (GST) reform was that the opposition realised this is a good reform. Therefore, it was reluctant to let it happen under the current regime," he said.