The main motive of the summit this year was to pitch for a defence corridor, but sources said that the policy for it is neither prepared nor presented before the Centre
GUWAHATI: Aligned with Government of India’s vision of Viksit Bharat by 2047, Atmanirbhar Bharat and Make in India campaign, Assam government had planned to organise Global Investors’ Summit like Advantage Assam which was held in 2018 in November this year, which would have witnessed participation of major global and Indian industrial houses.
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While presenting the 2024-25 state budget, finance minister Ajanta Neog had proposed to allocate Rs 25 crore for the global summit. Ironically the summit is postponed and it is not yet decided when the summit will be organised.
A source in the department of commerce and industries talking to GPlus on condition of anonymity said, “The investors summit was slated in the month of November this year but due to some unavoidable circumstances the event is postponed and the new timing is yet to be decided.”
On enquiring the reasons the source who is a senior official of the department said, “There are multiple reasons.” He explained that firstly November is slated for by-elections and even Panchayat elections are approaching. He said that whenever an event is organised it is not only dependent on the organisers but all stakeholders who will be participating in the event.
It needs to be mentioned that as the state was planning to organise a global investors' summit in November this year, many defence manufacturing players were expected to be invited. The defence corridor policy was expected to be prepared before the summit.
Defence industrial corridors aim to catalyse indigenous production of defence and aerospace-related items, thereby reducing reliance on imports and promoting export of these items to other countries which may create ample employment opportunities and growth of private domestic manufacturers, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and start-ups.
Another source in Dispur said that the defence corridor policy is not yet prepared and presented before the Centre and therefore the summit was better to be postponed.
The source said that the summit is being planned between the first three months of next year now but the main motive of the summit is defence corridor so unless the defence corridor policy and other protocols are not completed, the summit will be on hold.
As of now the Advantage Assam 2.0 is postponed and the defence corridor is a distant dream.