Projecting itself as an ideal investment destination, the Government of West Bengal is organising Bengal Global Business Summit — Bengal Leads 2015 — on January 7 and 8 to attract investment from foreign and domestic companies.
Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari are expected to attend. Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee will speak on the occasion besides interacting with investors.
The State is seeking investment in sectors such as urban infrastructure and housing, IT software and hardware, food processing, horticulture and floriculture, MSME and textiles, health care, education and skills development, manufacturing, energy and infrastructure, hospitality and tourism and business of entertainment and financial services. “This business summit will ride on growth achieved in the past three years. Since formation of our government, radical fiscal reforms have been done and massive capital formation is underway,” said West Bengal Finance and Industry Minister Amit Mitra.
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“Our strong growth performance is surpassing all India figures by a huge quantum. While India’s gross domestic product in 2013-14 was 4.7 per cent, our gross State domestic product was 8.62 per cent. While the Indian average industrial sector growth for the year was 0.4 per cent, we had achieved 8.74 per cent,” Mr. Mitra said highlighting the progress made by the State under Ms. Benerjee.
“In industrial production, all India growth in 2013-14 was minus 0.1 per cent whereas West Bengal’s IIP grew 6.3 per cent. We have invested heavily in building roads, bridges, colleges and drinking water facilities. There has been a tectonic shift in the mindset and we are moving towards more productivity,” the Minister said adding that there was zero man-day loss last year as compared to 78 lakh man-day loss in 2010-11.
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