Taking note of the success of business meets organised by Gujarat and West Bengal, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has expressed optimism on increasing competition among States to attract more investment.

In his latest Facebook post, the Finance Minister while appreciating efforts of West Bengal to lure investments, he said that Kolkata remained the principal engine of development in West Bengal’s growth and the State has to be redeveloped into an industrial centre once again.

‘Push reforms’

Jaitley said that the Centre would extend all support to the Mamata Banerjee-led Government to promote industry and boost growth in the State. He, however, added the West Bengal Government would have to consistently take pro-reform and business-friendly steps to build investor confidence.

The recently concluded Vibrant Gujarat Summit managed to attract investment of ₹25 lakh crore and West Bengal Global Summit saw commitments worth ₹2.5 lakh crore.

“States in India are going to compete with each other in cornering investment. I have no doubt that the ones which consistently and uniformly pursue reforms and business friendly policies are likely to succeed,” Jaitley said in his post titled ‘A Tale of Two Global Summits’.

“My participation in the West Bengal and Gujarat meet have enthused me. The idiom, vocabulary and mind-set of the organisers was to attract investment,” he said.

“My colleague Nitin Gadkari, who also attended the (West Bengal) summit, was willing to help the State in the creation of a Kolkata-Siliguri highway. If such a highway is combined with an industrial corridor, it will give a major boost to West Bengal. Creation of more townships, better infrastructure, an industrial corridor, more effective utilisation of the sea resource has to be a future agenda of the State,” he mentioned.

The GST implementation will increase the revenues of the State and part of the proceeds of the coal block auctions will augment its revenue, he said, adding NITI Aayog is intended to further decentralise the various schemes in the hands of the state government.

Terming the Gujarat Summit as a magnificent affair, he said that Union Ministers had shown up for Vibrant Gujarat after 10 years of absence which was attended by Prime Ministers, Ministers, policy makers from all over the world, large business groups – both domestic and international.

“Vibrant Gujarat has become the principal economic convention in the country. This year Vibrant Gujarat marketed India,” he said.

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