Gandhinagar: The first few minutes of the inaugural session of Vibrant Gujarat 2011 on Wednesday set the tone for events to unfold as investment promises worth $50 billion were announced within 50 minutes flat.
By the end of the first day of the two-day international business meet — 5th in the series started by chief minister Narendra Modi in 2003 — eyes of thousands of delegates from the world over were virtually popping out.
Memorandums of understanding (MoUs) for projects worth $333 billion (Rs 15 lakh crore) were signed. This staggering figure was higher than the total investment of $240 billion (Rs 12 lakh crore as per exchange rate then) promised in the previous summit held in January 2009. Even though actual investments during the subsequent downturn came only a trickle, Vibrant Gujarat has clearly branded itself as India’s biggest deal-maker.
The biennial summit was not limited to attracting investments. Top industrialists, world political leaders and diplomats as well as corporate honchos and economists endorsed the Gujarat growth story at the jam-packed convention hall of the newly-built Mahatma Mandir, venue for the event planned more meticulously than ever before. Around 25,000 delegates are likely to participate in the two-day event.
Terming the 21st century as not just the century of India but also that of the whole of Asia and Africa, a visibly pleased Modi said, “Vibrant Gujarat started as investment summits. It has now graduated to a much larger scale — from industrial development to inclusive growth. Our larger objective is global networking, knowledge and technology sharing.” Home-grown billionaire Gautam Adani symbolised the bullishness of Ahmedabad when said his group would invest over Rs 80,000 crore in ports, power and infrastructure projects.
Captains of the industry like Ratan Tata of Tata group, Adi Godrej of Godrej, AM Naik of L&T, GVK Reddy of GVK group, Ajit Gulabchand of HCC too announced their plans even as they hailed the Gujarat story. Tata said his group will partner the state in providing transportation into the hinterland. The good thing about the state’s growth is that it is inclusive with rural population too is gaining out of the development, he said. According to prime minister of Rwanda Bernard Makuza, India was no longer an emerging economy but a worldwide leader. Hideaki Domichi, ambassador of Japan, which is a partner country for the summit, termed Gujarat is one of the best states to do business in. Ron Somers, president of the US-India Business Council, said he would want US to partner the next edition of the summit.
Leader of Opposition in the Gujarat assembly Shaktisinh Gohil was not impressed by the show and said this “is a cosmetic excercise of megalomaniac Modi”. He said there was no transparency in the figures of actual investments on the ground. Besides, transfer of land to industry was breeding corruption.
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