Uttar Pradesh Speeds Ahead With Investment Proposals Worth Rs 33.50 Lakh Crore

As various states across India try to present themselves as the ideal investment destination in the country by hosting investors summits, it is not easy for a particular state’s summit to stand apart. States attempt to outdo each other in terms of providing maximum ‘ease of business’ and in providing government support at every point in the investment journey. Now, as far as numbers go, the recently concluded Uttar Pradesh Global Investors Summit 2023 (UPGIS23) managed to speed ahead of other states’ summits with respect to total investment proposals received.  

The three-day event, held at Vrindavan Yojana in Lucknow from February 8 onwards, witnessed participation from over 25,000 delegates, including more than 1,000 foreign delegates. Over the course of the 34 sessions that were held, the state raked in investment proposals worth Rs 33.50 lakh crore. The summit was graced by the presence of 10 partner countries—Netherlands, Denmark, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Australia, the United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, Italy and Mauritius—as well as the participation of delegates from 40 nations. Several ambassadors, high commissioners and other important foreign dignitaries also joined in, with H. E. Barry O’Farrell, the Australian high commissioner to India, remarking that many of his countrymen find the investment opportunities provided by Uttar Pradesh very interesting. The sudden rise of Uttar Pradesh (UP), from a ‘Bimaru’ state plagued by underdevelopment and other adverse business conditions, to becoming a leading investment destination in the country, is worth looking at.  
  
This transformation was also pointed out by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who addressed the inaugural session of UPGIS23. The prime minister said that Uttar Pradesh has created a new identity for itself in the last five-six years and that the state has seen improvement in every field from electricity to connectivity. This changed face of Uttar Pradesh managed to woo investors from all over India as well as from abroad. 

Investments Galore

As someone who has witnessed UP’s quick rise, Kumar Mangalam Birla, chairman of Aditya Birla Group, stated that he views the state as a prime driver of India’s growth story. At the UPGIS23, he announced his group’s next steps in the state thus, “As an early investor in the industrial journey of the state, we feel enthused by the rapid progress that the state is making. Today, the state can rightly be considered one of the key states driving India's journey towards a $5 trillion economy. And therefore, we are committing further investments to the tune of Rs 25,000 crore across our businesses, cement, metals, chemicals, financial services and renewable energy.”  

Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, also announced his plans to invest further in Uttar Pradesh. "We plan to invest an additional Rs 75,000 crore in UP over the next four years across Jio, retail, and renewable businesses," he said, adding that these investments will create over 1 lakh jobs in the state. The leading industrialist also picked UP for the pilot of two new initiatives from his conglomerate: Jio School and Jio AI Doctor. This is expected to bring top-quality education and affordable healthcare services to villages and small towns across the state. Additionally, he promised that Jio will complete its rollout of 5G to cover every town and village across UP by December 2023. N Chandrsekharan, another domestic industrial veteran, also joined in with new investment plans in the state. The Tata Sons chairman said that the Tata group has huge expansion plans in the state with its hotel business seeing a significant opportunity from religious and wildlife tourism, and that it is also going to build an integral multimodal air cargo through Air India SATS with the Zurich Airport at the upcoming Jewar Airport.   

Although India is well known for its services exports, foreign investors did not take much interest in the country’s manufacturing sector in the past. Uttar Pradesh has laid down some plans to change that as well. Speaking at the UPGIS23, Alex Chalk, the British minister of state for defence procurement, attested to the appeal of defence manufacturing investment in UP. He said, "Uttar Pradesh is playing its role on a large scale under the 'Make in India' campaign towards meeting India's defence needs and our contribution in this role will be in many areas including investment as well as manufacturing of strategic and tactical weaponry. With this, Uttar Pradesh will be able to meet the defence needs of India." He informed the state officials gathered at the summit that the United Kingdom will make investments in Uttar Pradesh in defence, aerospace and medical sectors.    

The US India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF) also took note of the importance given to manufacturing sector by Uttar Pradesh. Mukesh Aghi, the forum’s president said, “I commend the government on PLI reforms at the state level, given the focus on making India a manufacturing hub. The [UP] government has made a concerted efforts to attract investors across tech, manufacturing, green energy, education, pharma, and the healthcare space.” Overall, over the course of three days in Lucknow, more than 19,000 memorandums of understanding (MoU) were signed at the Uttar Pradesh Global Investors Summit 2023. These investment proposals will create close to 95 lakh job opportunities in the state, UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said.    

The chief minister added that his government is fully prepared to implement these investment proposals on the ground and that it will move in this direction at a rapid pace. Assuring investors of government assistance at every step of their investment journey in the state, he introduced investors to ‘Nivesh Mitra’, the state’s online single window portal. Around 406 services that fall under 33 departments can be accessed from this portal. On top of this, the state is also rolling out ‘Udyami Mitra’ under ‘Mukhya Mantri Udyami Mitra Yojan’ which will help investors coordinate with the required government departments to ensure that the investment proposals are successfully implemented. Since the UP government wants to provide ‘ease of doing business’ as well as ‘ease of starting business’, the state set a target of setting up 100 incubators and 33 state-of-the-art centres in the coming years to encourage start-up culture among the youth. This will help the investors coming here as they will get access to a huge pool of skilled and qualified youth, Prime Minister Modi said.    

At the valedictory session of UPGIS23, President Droupadi Murmu also lauded some of the efforts taken by the Yogi Adityanath government to promote traditional enterprises in the state. In the run up to the main summit, the UP government had held local summits across all 75 districts of the state to ensure that traditional enterprises got sufficient attention from investors. The president said, “Promotion of traditional industries not only leads to economic upliftment at the local level, investors also get a lot of opportunities. The way the state government has made efforts to simplify the procedures for investment in Uttar Pradesh is commendable.”