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India attractive destination for investors: Ravi

SINGAPORE: India remains “the most attractive destination for foreign investors” and its “economic fundamentals are very strong.”

Union Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi held out this assurance at the concluding session of the two-day ‘Global Indian’ event – the business-centric ‘Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) Singapore.’

In a bid to allay the “concerns” of external entrepreneurs, including non-resident Indians (NRI) and people of Indian origin (PIO) among foreign citizens, Mr. Ravi said “Singur is not India” in its entirety. He noted that industrialist Ratan Tata could find another place in India to re-locate his Nano car project, which was originally planned to come up at Singur in West Bengal. In fact, the ground reality in India was reflected in the fact that several other States vied to offer an alternative site for the project, Mr. Ravi emphasised.

The first-ever Asia-Pacific conference of the ‘Global Indian Diaspora’ was organised by the Singapore Indian Chamber of Commerce & Industry in association with the Confederation of Indian Industry. The event took place under the overall auspices of the governments of India and Singapore.

A high note of the day was the launch of a local publication, Tabla, focussed exclusively on the interests of NRIs and the PIO population in Singapore and the adjoining region.

Speaking to journalists, Mr. Ravi said he had initiated preliminary moves to set up three PIO-NRI universities in India on the lines of the currently approved institution, which would be ready in Bangalore next year. While 50 per cent of the seats in these universities would be reserved for the children of NRIs and PIO-nationals of foreign countries, modalities were being finalised to grant scholarships to the “poor” students in this category.

Mr. Ravi, who is scheduled to hold talks with the Malaysian authorities in Kuala Lumpur on Monday, said he “may sign” a memorandum of understanding with them on the welfare of Indian citizens working in that country. Nearly 1.5 lakh Indian workers were now resident in Malaysia. There was still some “dispute” to be resolved regarding the scope for setting a structure of minimum wages for them.

Hailing ‘PBD Singapore’ as a “wonderful” event, he said several other countries, including Mauritius with a big Indian-origin population, had now offered to host the next external ‘PBD.’ The regular annual ‘PBD,’ planned to be organised in Chennai next January, might attract over 1,500 delegates, he said.

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