Govt sets up empowered group of secretaries to attract investments to India

The government on Wednesday announced setting up of a high level empowered group of secretaries, to be chaired by the cabinet secretary, and a Project Development Cell (PDC) in ministries/ departments with a view to attracting investments to the country.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the Union Cabinet, chaired byPrime Minister Narendra Modi.

In order to provide support and facilitation to investors for investing in India, an Empowered Group of Secretaries (EGoS) is approved, the commerce and industry ministry said in a statement.

Its objectives include bringing synergies and ensuring timely clearances from different departments and ministries; to attract increased investments into India and provide investment support and facilitation to global investors; and to facilitate investments of top investors in a targeted manner and to usher policy stability and consistency in the overall investment environment.

It would also evaluate investments put forward by the departments on the basis of their project creation and actual investments that come.

It said these departments would be given targets for completion of various stages by the empowered group.

The group would comprise Niti Aayog CEO and secretaries from the DPIIT, Department of Commerce, Department of Revenue, Department of Economic Affairs and the concerned department head. Cabinet Secretary will be the chairperson and DPIIT secretary will be the member convenor.

Further, Project Development Cell (PDC) was approved for the development of investible projects in coordination between the central and state governments.

Under the guidance of the secretary, an officer not below the rank of joint secretary of each relevant central line ministry, who will be in-charge of the PDC, will be tasked to conceptualise, strategise, implement, and disseminate details with respect to investable projects.
 

The cell is aimed at creating projects with all approvals, land available for allocation and with the complete detailed project reports for adoption/ investment by investors; and to identify issues that need to be resolved in order to attract and finalise the investments and put forth before the empowered group.

"The decision will make India a more investor-friendly destination and give a fillip to the mission of Atmanirbhar Bharat...by handholding and further smoothening investment inflows into the country. This will give a boost to the economy and open up immense direct and indirect employment potential in various sectors," the statement said.

It added the government is determined to put in place an investment friendly ecosystem that strongly supports the domestic investor as well as FDI (foreign direct investment).

The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) proposes strategic implementation of an integrated approach that will eventually bring about synergies between ministries/departments and among the central and state governments in investment and related incentive policies, it said.

"In the midst of current ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, India is presented with an opportunity to attract FDI inflows into the country especially from large companies which seek to diversify their investments into new geographies and mitigate risks," it said.

Also, ramping up production across product lines will help to serve big markets in the US, EU, China and elsewhere and the proposal aims to take advantage of these opportunities from the global economic situation to make India among the largest players in the global value chain, it added.

"This new mechanism will reinforce India's vision of becoming a USD 5 trillion economy by 2024-25," it added.

FDI in India grew by 13 per cent to a record of USD 49.97 billion in the 2019-20 financial year.