Jaitley in US, CII biz delegation follows

A delegation of industry body CII, led by its President-designate Naushad Forbes, will join Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who is on a 10-day visit to the US.

During the visit, CII is organising a number of events and meetings with investors, large US corporations, pension funds and institutional investors to explore opportunities of increasing long-term investments from the US to India.

The discussions coming up are with pension funds like CalPERS, CalSTRS, University of Stanford Endowment and University of California Endowment, CII said in a statement.

It said "there is scope for far greater funding commitment from US companies as the quantum of American investment at USD 13 billion from April 2000 onwards does not match the size of our respective economies... In fact, Indian investments in the US surpass this figure".

It identified infrastructure, defence, smart cities, manufacturing as areas with tremendous potential to bolster bilateral ties.

"Defence industrial parks could be a good area of investment for this purpose," the industry body said, adding that US enterprises could enter into agreements with states and municipalities in India for specific project development.

The CII delegation includes Noel N Tata, Managing Director, Tata International; Rishad Premji, Chief Strategy Officer, Wipro and Ravi Parthasarathy, Chairman, IL&FS.

Jaitley, who is already in the US, will meet US Treasury Secretary, foreign institutional investors and industry leaders during his stay.