By Mahua Venkatesh
New Delhi, Jun 6: India, with an eye on the $5 trillion economy, is aggressively wooing foreign investors amid the geopolitical shifts and supply chain disruptions. Sources said that nodal ministries, state governments and authorities dealing with investments have been advised to take all necessary measures, to "handhold" foreign investors. The "Aatmanirbhar Bharat" plank is now being pitched as "Make in India for the World" after Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally held a series of meetings with Japanese investors in Tokyo recently.
"In the new emerging geopolitical order, India has positioned itself as a credible, dependable voice. Now the thrust is on the economy. The government is doing all that it can to facilitate and expedite investments," a government source told India Narrative.
He also said India will continue to be guided by its strategic autonomy "with a firm focus on growth" amid the global turmoil and disruption of the supply chain network.
India recorded its highest foreign direct investment of $83.57 billion in 2021-22.
Modi, during his two day visit to Tokyo to attend the QUAD summit, held meetings with more than 30 Japanese CEOs and top executives and invited them to invest in India. The Prime Minister also highlighted investment opportunities under the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme.
Last month, a large group of business leaders from South Korea visited Shimla to explore investment opportunities, something that surprisingly failed to hit the headlines.
Several South Korean companies have started the groundwork for setting up semiconductor manufacturing facilities in India. That apart, investors, not just South Koreans but a host of others primarily from the Asian economies have begun to explore possibilities for setting up manufacturing bases for electric vehicles (EV), EV components, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, renewable energy, agro and food processing, among others.
Inflow of Korean FDI into India is estimated at $1 billion annually, driven mainly by large companies and their suppliers in the field of automobiles, electronics and steel. But a host of small and medium companies are now increasingly pinning hopes of entering the Indian market.
"Further investments in chemicals and steel are currently being considered and small and medium-sized enterprises are also increasingly knocking the Indian market," South Korea's Ambassador to India, Chang Jae-bok said last week.
Maharashtra, New Delhi, Karnataka, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Andhra Pradesh are among the top states that received the highest FDI.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has already announced an outlay of Rs 1.97 lakh crore for the PLI schemes across 14 key sectors that is expected to create 60 lakh new jobs.
Investment commitments of Rs 2.34 lakh crore have been made under the programme.
"The Covid-19 pandemic, global tensions and disruptive challenges to stability and security in the Indo-Pacific region have underlined the need for building resilient supply chains, a human-centric development model and stable and strong international economic relations, capable of resisting coercion and exploitation," Modi said in Tokyo.
Bottomline: The government now wants foreign investors to cash in on India's Aatmanirbhar Bharat or the self reliance plank and set up manufacturing facilities in the country, which in turn will generate jobs while boosting overall economic growth.