Dubai's government has bought 2.87 per cent of ICICI Bank, India's second-largest lender, through Dubai International Capital, one of the agencies it has used to invest in some of Europe's biggest banks.

With more than $79 billion in assets, ICICI built its business by chasing consumer loans in Asia's third-largest economy, which Dubai hopes will help it become a global financial centre much as China powered the rise of Hong Kong.

The stake was worth 30.03bn Indian rupees ($741.5 million) at Thursday's closing price and would make Dubai International Capital the bank's sixth-largest shareholder.

"The strategic investment in ICICI supports the global diversification and growth mandate for DIC and its parent company, Dubai Holding...," Dubai International chief executive Sameer Al Ansari said.

Dubai Holding is owned by the government of Dubai, which said in March it wanted to build two of the world's largest financial institutions by 2015.

Dubai International and other state-owned agencies have bought into Deutsche Bank, HSBC and Standard Chartered in the past 12 months.

The 2.2pc stake in Deutsche Bank is held by an arm of the Dubai International Financial Centre, which the government set up to build a financial services hub in the Gulf emirate.

The centre is encouraging companies from around the region, especially those from India, to list on a bourse it opened in 2005, trumpeting it as the birth of the Arab Hong Kong. Indians make up the largest community of expatriates in the UAE, an oil-exporting federation that includes Dubai, and where foreigners make up more than 80pc of the population.