Narendra Modi will skip Rajasthan investors meet

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will give a miss to Resurgent Rajasthan. Chief minister Vasundhara Raje will have to settle now with finance minister Arun Jaitley to inaugurate the two-day event, starting on November 19. Commerce and industry minister Nirmala Sitaraman would address the valedictory session on November 20.

The who’s who of Indian industry, as well as many foreign investors, would attend the mega event held with high hopes of attracting investment to the state, which Ms Raje desperately needs in order to fulfill her electoral promise of providing 15 lakh jobs by the end of her tenure in 2018.

However, the PM’s absence who was expected to give a fillip to the investment summit has somewhat taken the sheen off the prestigious event. Earlier, the PM had attended investor summit of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh. Ms. Raje had personally invited the PM well in advance in June, five months before the investor meet. But, the PM’s office has reportedly cited busy schedule for skipping the event although the PM is expected to return by Tuesday and leave for Malaysia only on November 21. In fact, the chief minister had again met the PM in October, however, there was no indication from the PM that he would not attend the function. And, the state government till recently was hoping that the he would inaugurate the event.

Though, it would not affect participation from the investors, who have already given their consent to attend the meet, including Mr Anil Ambani of ADAG group, Mr Anand Mahindra of M&M, Mr K.M. Birla of AB Nuvo, Mr Kiran Mazumdar Shaw of Biocon, Mr Mohandas Pai of Manipal Global, Mr Sunil Kant Munjal of Hero Moto Corp, Mr Vijay K. Thadani of NIIT, Ms Shobana Kamineni of Apollo Hospitals, Mr S.N. Eisenhower of Saint-Gobain Glass India, Mr Rakesh Bharti Mittal of Field Fresh Foods, Mr Vipin Sondhi of JCB India Ltd and Mr Katsushi Inoue of Honda Cars.

The first day of the two-day event will witness eight sectoral sessions along with two country-specific sessions.