Ministers have been forced on the defensive following claims Britain is trying to sell arms worth £1 billion to India.

The controversy has been heightened because the country is still locked in a deadly stand-off with Pakistan following a terrorist attack in Delhi before Christmas.

Claim's in the weekend's media suggest members of the government have been lobbying India to buy 60 Hawk jets from BAE systems.

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: "We have one of the toughest export licensing regimes in the world. We will continue to judge all applications for Pakistan and India against its stringent criteria."