Clinton, who has used his celebrity clout to become a global anti-Aids campaigner, welcomed new Indian health ministry figures suggesting a sharp slowdown in HIV infection rates in the country of over one billion people.

But speaking at a national business conference, Clinton -- whose Arkansas-based William J. Clinton Foundation, has struck deals with drug firms to buy costly Aids drugs and distribute them in Africa, India and elsewhere -- said the numbers were no reason for complacency.

African nations, which had India's rate of HIV infection of less than one percent just a decade ago, were grappling with Aids epidemics of "unimaginable proportions", he told a national business conference on Aids.

"If India acts now," it can save itself from going down that road, said Clinton.

"You have come too far, worked too hard" to follow another course, Clinton said, referring to India's emerging economic superpower status, driven by its booming outsourcing industry.