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Toronto, Sept. 12 - India scored a facile eight-wicket victory over West Indies to go one up in the Toronto Cricket Festival series of three One-Day Internationals here on Saturday.

Put in to bat first, the Caribbeans were contained to 163, all out, in 46.2 overs by Indian bowlers who maintained line and length with their fielders holding some good catches to win the series opener.

Chasing an easy target, the Indians reeled off the required runs for the loss of only two wickets in 37.3 overs thanks to skipper Saurav Ganguly and new opening batsman S. Ramesh who both scored unbeaten half centuries.

Ganguly, who shared an undefeated 106-run third wicket partnership with Ramesh, was declared man of the match for his flawless innings of 54 which included seven hits to the rope and a soaring six.

Ramesh was India's top scorer with 55 which included eight elegant boundaries.

Earlier, West Indians made a poor start losing four wickets for 59 though their opener Sherwin Campbell had kept one end intact for some time.

The latter scored 62 off 95 balls. He cracked six boundaries in his 142-minute innings before he was stumped by wicket-keeper M.S.K. Prasad off Sunil Joshi.

Ricardo Powell, who scored brilliant 124 in a four-wicket win against India in the Singapore International Challenge replayed final earlier this week, showed his firework for a brief period.

He hit five boundaries and two towering sixes in his breezy innings of 37 off 34 balls. The West Indies innings folded quickly soon after the 20-year-old Powell from Jamaica was out, caught by Jacob Martin off Robin Singh who finished the day with three for 43. Debashish Mohanty, Nikhil Chopra and Joshi picked up two wickets each.

West Indies skipper Brian Lara, who was bubbling with confidence of beating India at Friday's press conference, took the defeat with grace.

"Indians played better and deserved to win," he said during the post-match press conference on Saturday.

"We are one game down but we are not out of the series. We will go all out to win the remaining two games," the West Indies ace batsman said. Lara partly blamed his team's failure to long journey from Singapore to Toronto and said:

"My boys were totally tired and exhausted. Indians too could be tired but they adopted the conditions quickly."

Ganguly, who led the Indian side in the absence of unfit captain Sachin Tendulkar, said he was delighted over his team's grand win.

"Our bowlers did well to justify my decision to send Lara's side in to bat first after I won the toss," he said.

Their remaining two matches will be played on Sunday and Tuesday.