Telangana Minister for Industries and Information Technology KT Rama Rao has blamed the Union government’s attempts to discriminate against States like Telangana when it comes to attracting investments.
Citing the decision to locate a Defence Industrial Corridor in Bundelkhand, he said he had suggested to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to consider allotting the corridor to the Hyderabad-Bengaluru belt as the two cities already had a base of the defence public sector units. He was addressing a CII Leadership summit here on Wednesday.
“She told me the decision had been made and that it would come up at Bundelkhand. But will it be able to attract Lockheed Martin? Will it be able to attract a Sikorsky? Or will it be able to invite some of these large aerospace companies and give them the confidence which can hit the ground running,” Rao asked.
Stating that the country needed to play to its strengths, he felt that decisions should not be made based on political interests. He also cited an example where a large aerospace and defence company was asked to locate his company in Bundelkhand. “We (the State) can’t do anything,” he said.
If the country didn’t allow the firms to invest where they wanted, they might go to countries like Indonesia and Malaysia.
“Telangana – the best start-up zone”
The Minister said that the State was the most successful startup since Independence.
“At the time of bifurcation in 2014, the annual per capita income of Telangana was ₹1.24 lakh and the current annual per capita income is ₹2.78 lakh, registering a growth of 125 per cent,” he said. “The GSDP (Gross State Domestic Product) now stood at ₹11.54 lakh crore as against ₹5-lakh crore in 2014, showing a growth of 130 per cent,” he said.
Quoting a Reserve Bank of India (RBI) estimate, he said Telangana was the fourth largest contributor to GDP.
Deepak Bagla, Managing Director and CEO, Invest India, said that the country received a growth in FDI inflows during the pandemic from a host of countries in diverse sectors. “The start-up growth story of Telangana has become a case study for many top business schools. Telangana is registering more than a 0 per cent growth rate every year. In the ease of doing business ranks, the State is among the top performers,” he said.