Global investors meet in Bangalore

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGAORE, MAY 6. The Government of Karnataka in association with the Confederation of Indian Industry is hosting a high-profile month-long ``Global Investors Meet'' here, beginning on June 5, to showcase Karnataka as an attractive investment destination for firms and entrepreneurs from around the world.

A distinctive feature of the meet will be that the State Government will receive concrete investment proposals from prospective investors, hold discussions with them about how to accelerate project execution and at the end of the month the Government hopes to be able to provide all statutory clearances required for the proposals submitted during the meeting. This would obviate the need for the investing firms to subsequently spend time on obtaining all the approvals required at the State level.

Mr. B. S. Patil, Secretary (Industries) to the Government of Karnataka, said the organisers hoped that about 2,000 delegates would participate in the conference and that the road shows on the meet will be held around the country from next week onwards. The senior official stated that the Government hoped to attract a number of first-time visitors from abroad to the meeting. Mr. Patil also said that besides generating interest in the investment opportunities offered by Karnataka and clearance of specific projects, the forum should throw up a broad range of issues relating to industry that needed to be addressed by the Government.

Mr. Patil said that the agenda for the conference first mooted a couple of years ago had since been expanded to a lot more than just demonstrating the investment opportunities in Karnataka. The Global Investors Meet will comprise two parts. The first will be a two-day Global Investors Conference at which national policy issues will be the subject of discussion between policy-makers and delegates. Among the speakers at the conference will be Mr. Yashwant Sinha, Union Finance Minister, Mr. S. M. Krishna, Chief Minister of Karnataka, Dr. Manmohan Singh, former Union Finance Minister, Dr. Bimal Jalan, Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, Dr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Member of the Planning Commission, and leading industrialists like Mr. Narayanamurthy of Infosys and Mr. Rahul Bajaj of Bajaj Auto.

The two-day conference will be followed by the meet at which investment proposals will be prepared and discussed. In addition to the investment proposals that the investors themselves may come with or prepare during the meet, the State Government has also identified a list of projects in the infrastructure that investors may be interested in.

These were in tourism, power, urban development and roads. Specific projects costing over $200 million that are on offer include minor airports (at Bellary, Hubli, Gulbarga and Mysore), a 220-km highway (Bellary-Hubli), industrial townships (Bangalore rural district and Belgaum district), hotels and resorts (in North Karnataka and at Jog Falls) and an eco-tourism project in Shimoga district.

Government officials hope that the Global Investors Meet will facilitate an acceleration in the industrial growth of Karnataka. The target for the annual growth of industry was 10 per cent, while actual growth now is around 6-7 per cent.

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Section  : Business
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