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Created: 17 February 2020

BENGALURU & KOLKATA: In a succeeding event to the grand curtain raiser heralding the J&K Government's first Investors' Summit, grand road-shows being organised to cover pan India – started today with Bengaluru & Kolkata to allow prospective investors have a dialogue on the immense investment opportunities presented by the verdant region. 

Providing a platform for the business communities to deliberate upon how the newly formed Union Territory's potential may be leveraged, the road-shows will cover numerous cities like Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, Ahmadabad in the month of February and March 2020. The road-shows intend to get along business hubs to draw together investors, decision-makers, senior government officials and the local business community in a stimulating dialogue that can spur the region's industrial growth and manufacturing across 14 identified focus sectors.

The Government led Industrial delegation including Manzoor Ahmad Lone, Secretary, Agriculture and Horticulture; Simrandeep Singh, MD, JK ITIDC; Shahid Iqbal Choudhary, DC Srinagar; Anoo Malhotra, Director, Industries & Commerce, Jammu; Atul Sharma, MD, SICOP with other senior Government officials addressed the gathering. Prominent industrialists  Vikram Gupta, MD Airmesh;  Satish Koul, Resident Director Emcure along with J&K bank, tourism representatives were also present.

Speaking on the occasion, Kewal Kumar Sharma, Advisor to   Lieutenant Governor, J&K emphasised that “A new version of J&K - J&K 2.0 is all set to emerge as the UT is now at par with rest of India.”  He further remarked that every district of Jammu & Kashmir has a distinct heritage, culture & history and huge untapped potential.

 Rohit Kansal, Principal Secretary, Planning Development and Monitoring Department made a detailed presentation on investment opportunities in J&K; he highlighted 14 distinct sectors including tourism, education, healthcare and infrastructure which presented the greatest opportunities for potential investors. He also made a reference to the investor friendly policies and sector specific policies. He elaborated that with an aim to make Jammu and Kashmir an industrial hub more than 48 investible projects and new 14 focus sector have been identified, which are investor-friendly and easy to business. 6000 + Acres of industrial and sector-specific land bank has been identified to attract large, mega and small industries to create more employment opportunities in the newly formed UT. JKTPO has also started its Investment Facilitation Cell at Delhi and also planning same for Jammu & Srinagar.

 The Presentation was followed by film on UT of J&K and a presentation on IT Sector by Simrandeep Singh, MD JK ITIDC. “We are coming up with two IT parks with plug and play facility and are also in process of finalizing our new industrial promotion policy,” informed  Bipul Pathak, Principal Secretary – IT, J&K. He also highlighted that there are immense opportunities for skilled manpower in the UT and the government is offering productive incentives and relaxations in several industry sectors.

“The Union Territory of J&K is one of the best destinations in the country for setting up residential schools, smart schools, skill centres,” opined  Hirdesh Kumar, Commissioner Secretary, School Education who led the Road show held  at Kolkata for the upcoming Jammu and Kashmir Global Investors' Summit.

“We are confident that such steps coupled with the Central Governments and UT Administration’s efforts to restore normalcy in J&K will soon create an environment for attracting industry to the UT,” said Mr Sandipan Chakravortty, Past Chairman, CII Eastern Region while addressing the gathering.

During Road show at Kolkata a detailed presentation was made by  Ravinder Kumar, MD, JKTPO, which highlighted all the 14 Focus sectors and initiatives taken by Government to improve industrial ecosystem in UT. It was followed by UT J&K film and presentation on Tourism Sector by Zubair Ahmad, Administrative Secretary, Tourism. Also prominent industrialists Gagan Jain, Director VKC Nuts Pvt Ltd were present during the sessions.

These parallel road-shows consist of a series of round-table discussions and networking opportunities including G2B, B2G and B2B meetings, all conducted via strategic sector-specific sessions to maximise industrial growth and employment opportunities. The event was attended by 245 delegates and 33 B2G meetings were held. 34 no of MoU with total worth of 2847 crores were signed during both parallel road shows.

Some prominent industry groups present were Phillips Carbon Black Ltd, Apeejay Surrendra Park Hotels Limited , Pearl tree Hotels & Resorts, Sasa Chakra Infrastructure, Triumph Hotels & Asset Management, Toyota Kirloskar, Flipkart, Oracle India, Big Basket, Cropnosys, Indus Valley Ayurvedic Centre, Arvind Mills etc. In addition, Flipkart committed market access through its Samarth portal. Oracle proposed an excellence centre and collaboration with educational institutions to provide free software support as part of its Oracle academy. 

During the road shows, organised in Bengaluru & Kolkata, Government officials interacted with business leaders to decipher how the newly formed Union Territory's potential can provide umpteen numbers of opportunities. IT & ITeS, Manufacturing, Food Processing and Bio-Technology were the primary focus sectors of the Bengaluru Roadshow. While Engineering and Tourism were the prime focus sectors of the Kolkata Road-show to lure the investment opportunities in the newly formed UT.

The roadshows were organised by Jammu and Kashmir Trade Promotion Organization (JKTPO), a nodal agency for Government of J&K along with Media Partner PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) as the National Partner and Ernst & Young as the Knowledge Partner.