Our government strongly supports public private partnership, Modi tells US CEOs at financial sector roundtable

Kicking off his five-day visit to the United States with a roundtable interaction with American CEOs linked to the financial sector, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Thursday that his government strongly supports the notion of a partnership between the public and private sectors.

"Our government strongly supports Public Private Partnership," Prime Minister Modi said at the first meeting of the day with captains of American industry inside the Waldorf Astoria Hotel here.

He further went on to speak about the efforts made by his government over the last 15 months to increase investment in areas of taxation, infrastructure and foreign direct investment.

Welcoming the positive predictions about India by global financial bodies and rating agencies, the Prime Minister said, "GDP growth last year was 7.3 percent. There has been a 40 percent increase in FDI. The World Bank (WB), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Moody's have said that the economic climate is bound to improve further."

According to MEA spokesman Vikas Swarup, eight CEOs are taking part in the first roundtable with Prime Minister Modi. They are (1)Vicki Fuller, Chief Investment Officer, New York State Common Retirement Fund; (2) Jamie Dimon, Chairman, CEO and President, J P Morgan; (3) Steve Schwarzman, Chairman, CE) and Co-Founder, Blackstone; (4) Charles Kaye, Co-CEO, Warburg Pincus; (5) Henry Kravis, Co-Chairman and Co-CEO, KKR; (6) Bill Ford, CEO, General Atlantic; (7) Peter Ford, President and CEO, AIG Insurance and (8) Chase Coleman, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Tiger Global.

Modi, who is on his second visit to the United States, has a "packed schedule" ahead of him, which includes addressing world leaders at a landmark UN Sustainable Development Summit, interacting with top CEOs and Indian diaspora in the Silicon Valley.

In New York the roundtable on the financial sector is being described as a very important meeting with foreign institutional investors (FIIs) expressing a keenness to invest in India, and seeking promised deliverables from the Indian Government.

Prime Minister Modi will also attend roundtables on media and communications hosted by News Corp's Rupert Murdoch and attend a dinner with Fortune 500 company CEOs.

He would then fly to the West Coast for his visit to California from September 26-27.