Summit offers may remain on paper, feel Surat businessmen

Of the five memorandums of understanding (MoUs) signed on Tuesday, four are with associations which are not financially sound.

While the South Gujarat Texturisers Association is mostly defunct and without a proper office, the head of the South Gujarat Textile Processors' Association is a suspended police constable-turned-senior BJP leader, who was recently jailed in the Rs 100-crore Diamond Jubilee Co-operative Bank scam.

"These are not memorandums of understanding, but memorandums of misunderstandings," quipped a veteran textile industry watcher.

The biggest MoU signed on Wednesday was between the Gujarat Hira Bourse (GHB) and the government. GHB president Chandrakant Sanghvi and state industries commissioner Amarjeet Singh signed the MoU in the presence of the chief minister Narendra Modi at the Jewel Mart.

The MoU is for setting up a Jewellery Park in Surat. The park will have 200 units at a cost of Rs 3,000 crore in the special economic zone (SEZ) and 300 more in the domestic market at an estimated cost of Rs. 1,500 crore.

Rs 100 crore has been earmarked for the development of infrastructural facilities such as a training centre and a research and development centre.

The state government will provide land at a reasonable cost for the proposed park.

The GHB is promoted by the Surat diamond cutting and polishing industry.

Another such organisation, Surat Hira Bourse, is already operational in the city.

The GHB was set up recently and is promoted by a group of diamond exporters.

Surat Diamond Association (SDA) president Nanubhai Patel feels that the MoU would go a long way in helping the diamond cutting and polishing industry.

"We have identified a plot at Ichhapore in the Hazira industrial area for the jewellery park," Nanubhai said.

However, many in the industry are skeptical about this.

The industry has mainly developed in the Varachha Road, Katargaam, Mahidharpura and Ved Road areas.

"The industry has refused to shift to new areas. Many attempts to move the industry had been abandoned in the past", says an eminent exporter.

According to this exporter, the MoU is only a guarantee that the Gujarat government had extended to the GHB.

"Does the MoU define the exact role of the government and the kind of financial support the government proposes to provide for the project?" asked another diamond merchant.

Similarly, the government and the South Gujarat Texturisers Association signed an MoU for modernising the member units at a cost of Rs 3,000 crore.

The association is almost defunct without proper information on the members and units.

The South Gujarat Textile Processors' Association also signed an MoU for modernisation of member units at a cost of Rs 2,500 crore.

"The amount in the MoU is far in excess of the total networth of all the 450 process houses put together in Surat", an industry source said.

The association president C R Patil, arrested after the Rs 100-crore Diamond Jubilee Co-operative Bank scam, is currently out on bail.