Fresh investments into Tamil Nadu more than doubled to over ₹1,00,000 crore during the pandemic-hit 2020-21, with the southern State witnessing the second highest investment outlay among all the States. Maharashtra, which got the highest investments in 2019-20, remained on top in 2020-21 as well.
Tamil Nadu jumped from the ninth position in 2019-20, when 465 projects worth ₹47,833 crore were announced, to the second in 2020-21, with 573 projects worth ₹1,02,652 crore, as per data compiled for The Hindu by Projects Today, an independent firm tracking investment projects in the country.
Tamil Nadu was ranked 12th among all States in 2018-19, with a 3.67% share of fresh investments into India of ₹16.86 lakh crore. While overall investments in 2019-20 dropped sharply to just ₹10.86 lakh crore, the State’s share had improved to 4.41% of the total investments in the country.
Project investments fell a further 1.23% in 2020-21 as the COVID-19 pandemic hit investments in the first half of the year followed by a tentative recovery in the second. However, Tamil Nadu’s share of the country’s investments more than doubled to 9.6%.
The State began 2020-21 on a strong note, managing to garner a sixth of investments in the first quarter when private investments collapsed amid the lockdown. The State government signed 17 pacts with private investors in May, bolstering its investment pipeline by ₹18,533 crore in Q1 across sectors.
Over the second and third quarters, Tamil Nadu got fresh investments of nearly ₹61,000 crore, giving it the second and third ranks among States respectively. Some of the major private investments were the ₹4,629 crore solar photovoltaic modules project by SunEdison Energy India, a ₹2,500 crore lithium-ion batteries project in Tiruvallur by Lucas-TVS and a ₹2,300 crore plant being set up by Daimler India Commercial Vehicles at Oragadam.
