MP investors meet: Zee chief offers to build 5 smart cities

Seeking to contribute towards realising the government's plan for 100 smart cities, Essel Group chairman Subhash Chandra Friday asked Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan to allot him five cities in the state to enable him turn them into smart cities.

"I was personally thrilled to hear the announcement of 100 smart cities by Prime Minister Narendra Modi because we were also thinking along those lines." Chandra, who is also chairman of Zee Entertainment, said in his address on the concluding day of the "Invest Madhya Pradesh - Global Investors Summit - 2014" here.

"Give us existing five cities, it can be through competitive bidding also, so that we can build them into smart cities," he added.

Informing the gathering that an estimated Rs.7,500 crore will be spent on converting the cities into smart cities, Chandra said: "We want to do it through the PPP (public-private partnership) model."

The two-day summit here saw a galaxy of industry captains pledging major amounts of investment in Madhya Pradesh. Aomng those attending were Mukesh Ambani, Cyrus Mistry, Adi Godrej, Gautam Adani, Anil Ambani, Shashi Ruia, Y.C. Deveshwar, A.M. Naik, and Baba Kalyani, besides ambassadors and high commissioners from 28 countries.

"I'm personally privileged and delighted by participating in this summit. Our cumulative investment in MP is Rs.20,000 crore in two years," Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) chairman Mukesh Ambani said.

The Madhya Pradesh chief minister has announced that the state government will establish a Rs.100 crore venture capital fund and a separate department for the development of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).

Reliance ADA Group chairman Anil Ambani Thursday committed Rs.60,000 crore investment in Madhya Pradesh over the next 15 years, having already pumped in over Rs.30,000 crore in the state in four growth areas.

"We are committing ourselves to doubling our investment in the state from the current Rs.30,000 crore to Rs.60,000 crore by 2020 in four key growth areas -- coal, power, cement and telecom," Ambani told the investors summit.

Tata Group chairman Cyrus Mistry said Tata Consultancy Services would expand its footprint in MP and a new integrated campus will be opened at Indore.

"It'll create 10,000 jobs for IT professionals. We're also setting up a mechanic training centre in Bhopal and have signed an MoU with state government for growing high yield pulses and a processing and packaging facility for it in Vidisha," Mistry said.

Gautam Adani, chairman of Adani Group, announced the setting up of a world-class grain storage facility in the state and committed an investment of Rs.20,000 crore in the next five years.

Future Group chief executive Kishore Biyani said his retail group would open new stores in Bhopal, Ujjain, Satna and Katni and set up a food park in the state that would create over 10,000 jobs locally.

ITC, with a major presence in the state's farm sector, has planned to set up an eco-friendly paper industry in the state.

"People of India are fortunate to have dynamic leadership under Narendra Modi as PM at the Centre and Shivraj Singh Chouhan as CM of MP. We'll follow what they said on value-addition in agriculture that would create more jobs," said ITC chairman Y.C. Deveshwar.