Sukhbir brainstorms with global industrial giants

New Delhi/Chandigarh, October 13, 2012: The Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal today held a detailed brainstorming session with global industrial giants to give final touches to a blueprint aimed at holistic development of the state with focus on education, health, industrial development and infrastructure. In the 3^rd meeting of Punjab Advisory Council held here today in which industrial giants like S.K. Munjal of Hero Group, Malvinder Singh, Fortis Health Care, Naresh Gujral, Member Parliament, Mohit Gujral, Vice President DLF India, Rakesh Bharti Mittal of Airtel Bharti Group, Kamal Oswal of Nahar Industries, Neeraj Saluja of SEL Ltd. and Rajinder Gupta of Trident Group besides senior members of bureaucracy led by Chief Secretary Rakesh Singh participated, the group held six hour intensive discussion to finalize a model of development for Punjab that would prepare Punjab for challenges of next 50 years.

Chairing the meeting along with Member Parliament Naresh Gujral, the Deputy Chief Minister said that he had intentionally constituted investment advisory council to take qualitative inputs in the governance of the state from all sections of the society. He said that as per decision in the last meeting the Punjab industry department has already finalized a plan to set up industrial clusters and work on acquisition of land for Derabassi cluster has already started and another clusters were being planned in under developed area of district Ropar, Hoshiarpur, Pathankot and Gurdaspur. He said that the Punjab government had already promulgated an ordinance to create a special purpose vehicle for handing over the maintenance of industrial areas to industrialists themselves. Welcoming the suggestion for coming out with the plan for boosting agro based industry in the state, Badal said that the value edition of agriculture which was presently below 6% has to be taken to minimum 40%. Badal said that the Chief Secretary had recently visited Pakistan and they have already agreed to allow export of 6,000 items equivalent to Karachi port through Wagah border and India and Pakistan both have agreed to upgrade infrastructure on the border to meet the requirement of expected fivefold increase in export. He said that export from Wagah border that was presently Rs.2 billion would rise to Rs.10 billion in next 3 years and Punjab has to be prepared to reap its benefits to its fullest extent. Badal said that besides encouraging farmers to go for vegetable cultivation for export, our industrial and trade sector has to remain prepared for new opportunities in the horizon. He said that he would visit Pakistan next month along with industry delegation to work out the modalities.

Constituting sub committees on skill development, IT and IT enabled services, Industry, Healthcare, Infrastructure and Education, Badal said that these sub committees would deliberate every week to finalize their plans up to November and based on the reports of sub committees Punjab government would tweak its policies, firm up legislative business and draw a comprehensive holistic development policy for the state and Punjab government would organize road shows in various states and countries to attract investment in infrastructure, industry and trade sector showcasing the policy frame work.

Focusing on the Education sector, Badal said that Punjab was planning edu-cities in Mullanpur, Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Amritsar and he has already invited top universities of the world to set up their universities on the pattern of Oxford in the proposed edu-cities. He said that he has already called a meeting of education department to revamp the primary and secondary education system making every teacher accountable.

Emphasising on skill development of 1 lac youth, Badal asked Technical Education department to focus on employability of the trained youth and firm up “hub and spoke model” for upgradation of 1396 ITIs. Vowing to make Amritsar as international tourist hub, Badal said that a heritage village, a boutique hotel in Gobindgarh Fort and entertainment hub in Wagah border would put Amritsar on international tourist circuit.

Stressing on planned urban development, Badal said that he has already finalized 50 urban states and new estate at Anandpur Sahib has also been planned.

Unveiling the integrated development plan for 142 cities at the cost of Rs.8745 crore, Badal said that Punjab would be first state that would hand over total development of the city to one agency. He said that the Punjab government had already approved posting of Chief Financial Officer for every urban planning body and a senior IAS officer would be appointed mission head for integrated urban development project. Badal said that he would soon finalize metropolitan planning committees for Sahibzada Ajit Sing Nagar, Amritsar, Patiala, Bathinda, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Moga, Kapurthala and Pathankot and he would seek the services of experts in these committees to give quality input on various fields.

The Chief Secretary informed that Punjab government has already tied up with RBI that was instructing all nationalized banks for online disbursal of various subsidies to the citizens through banks. He said that by 31 March Punjab plans to cover 90% citizens under Aadhar Scheme and by integrating Aadhar with bank accounts subsidy payment would be facilitated. He said that Punjab was also working on multi-model travel plan for big cities of the state.

Underlining the need for generation of employment avenues, Badal said that focus area of industrial development would be IT, Food and Agro processing, textile and automobile ancillary industry.

Prominent amongst those who participated in the meeting included Dr. Parmod Kumar, Kalpana Mittal Barua, Principal Resident Commissioner Delhi, S.S. Channy, Principal Secretary Technical Education, Ajay Kumar Mahajan, Special Principal Secretary to Deputy Chief Minister and B. Purshartha, Director Technical Education.