The Adani Group said that it would double its investment in West Bengal, even as the State closed its fourth global business summit by signing MoUs worth Rs. 2.19 lakh crore. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said that these were new proposals and 50 % of last summit’s proposals (worth Rs. 2.35 lakh crore) were under implementation.
Focus on job creation
“The focus now is on employment generation”, she said, adding that these proposals were expected to create 20 lakh jobs. The State government announced three policies to promote business. These pertained to logistics park development and promotion, export promotion, and RO-RO (Roll on roll off vehicle) operation.
Pranav Adani, Director of Adani Enterprises and Managing Director, Adani Wilmar said that the company had already doubled its edible oil refining capacity at Haldia and was now boosting the packaging facilities. “We are planning to get into agri-logistics and will double our investment to Rs. 1,500 crore by 2023. We would like to replicate our Mundra Port in West Bengal if we get the opportunity”, he said.
Even as more MoUs were under negotiation, the 110 MoUs already signed pertained to manufacturing and infrastructure (Rs. 1.56 lakh crore), MSME and textiles (Rs. 52,952 crore), hospitality and tourism (Rs. 1,483 crore), IT & ITes (Rs. 1,146 crore), animal resource development, food processing fisheries and agro business (Rs. 1,518 crores) and health, education & skill development (Rs. 6,015 crore).
Replicate Mundra Port
The Adani group has also expressed interest to replicate Mundra Port that the group has in Kutch, in West Bengal. Adani group already has investment worth Rs 750 crore in Bengal, said Pranav Adani, MD, Adani Wilmar on the second and final day of Bengal Global Business Summit.
“We run the largest network of ports in the country. Given the geographical location of West Bengal that connects to South East As ia and north eastern states, we look forward to bring our expertise in the state. We believe we can revolutionize the entire port scenario here, and it will create a massive driving force to boost employment. We seek your support for that. Given an opportunity we would like to replicate Mundra port that we have in Kutch, in West Bengal,” said Adani.
Speaking about the company’s investment in Bengal, he added that there are scopes for doubling the investment in next five years. “Currently our investment in West Bengal is currently in an excess of Rs 750 crore. We expect to double the investment in next five years,” he said in presence of chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
“The Adani group also runs the largest network of power plants and transmission circuit. Our portfolio includes thermal and solar power as well. We would also like to further enable the power and energy sector here by bringing out renewable transmission expertise in the state in addition over thermal power generation capacity,” added Adani.
In addition to port and power, he said that his group is also interested in agro-logistic sector in Bengal. “We also run the largest agriculture business in the country that spans to every corner of the country. West Bengal is already a critical part of the success. At this point we have already created over 4500 direct and indirect employment in the state. In last years, we have already doubled our capacity from 800 metric ton to 1600 metric ton for the edible oil refinery per day in Haldia. Packaging capacity has also been expanded from 1,200 tonnes to 1,800 tonnes,” he said.
Source: The Hindu, Economic Times
