NEW DELHI: The Indian state of Madhya Pradesh has announced plans for developing economic relations with the Arabian Gulf countries. The state government will organise a ‘Mini-Investors’ Meet’ next year in the state capital Bhopal, which will be exclusively focused on enhancing investment ties with the Gulf.
This was announced in a report on the outcome of the state’s Chief Minister Kamal Nath’s recent visit to Saudi Arabia and Dubai in November. The state has confirmed plans for increased business ties with Dubai following the chief minister’s visit.
In October this year, Madhya Pradesh hosted the Kamal Nath government’s first big investors’ meet in the city of Indore with the theme ‘Magnificent Madhya Pradesh’. Nath’s trip to Dubai was the outcome of deliberations at this investors’ conclave.
The Chief Minister’s extensive meetings with officials and entrepreneurs in Dubai and with ministers in Saudi Arabia have now led to the idea of smaller conclave solely devoted to investments in and from the Gulf. Nath was elected Chief Minister a year ago.
In the report on his Gulf initiative, Nath promised to take his state “to the next level from merely producing commodities to producing goods and services by processing commodities, harnessing the potential of local people and leveraging the location advantage that the state offers.”
The report reiterated plans that the Chief Minister and his delegation discussed in Dubai for a logistics park and a dry port in Madhya Pradesh, proposals for air-linking Indore with Dubai, a hyperloop-based cargo system among the cities of Indore, Bhopal and Jabalpur as well as feasibility of an information technology unit near Bhopal by a private sector entity from Dubai.
