Two-Day Punjab Investors Summit Begins Thursday

The two-day Progressive Punjab Investors Summit will begin on Thursday in Mohali with the AAP government presenting Punjab as the best investment destination to attract investments in the border state. At the summit, there are going to be nine sessions on key areas including agri-food processing, textiles, healthcare, education, tourism, information technology and start-ups, said officials here.

The theme of the summit is 'Invest in the Best' with the state government projecting Punjab as the most preferred investment destination in the country. Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Wednesday said his government is holding its first investment summit and investors from many countries will be participating in it.

“Our government's first @invest_punjab summit is going to be held tomorrow in Punjab. Investors from several countries are taking part in it. Today, the officials of Germany's agro-company @BWRE_Global came to meet and assured of making investment in Punjab,” said Mann in a tweet in Punjabi on Wednesday. 

Mann had visited many states including Chennai, Hyderabad, and Mumbai and even gone to Germany to seek investments. He earlier had said that the summit would go a long way in ensuring holistic industrial development of the state.  Mann had said that the main motive behind giving a fillip to industrialization in the state was to reverse the trend of brain drain in the state by opening new vistas of employment for the youth.

The state government had urged the industrialists to make optimum use of this congenial atmosphere backed by excellent infrastructure, electricity, skilled human resources and best industrial and work culture to spread their business ventures in Punjab. Early this month, the AAP government had come out with a new industrial policy, promising ease of doing business, fiscal and non-fiscal incentives and also focusing on key areas like infrastructure, micro, small and medium enterprises, large enterprises, innovation and. 

As per the policy, the state will also allow the setting up of dedicated country-specific integrated industrial townships to attract investment by allowing the infrastructure and other norms of the country. The new policy also provides for an electricity tariff at Rs 5.50 per unit for five years, besides providing fiscal incentives for ultra-mega, mega projects, anchor units, large units, MSMEs and incentives for the rehabilitation of sick Large units and special incentives for units in the border zone, startup and incubators. 

In the last ten months, the AAP government had received investments worth Rs 38,175 crore in various industrial verticals.