Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Saturday urged Commerce and Industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman to set up an industrial corridor in Odisha to create state-of-the-art infrastructure in the state to help realise its economic potential.
"It is requested that the industrial corridor in Odisha be taken up simultaneously along with the Visakhapatnam-Chennai Industrial Corridor (VCIC) which is envisaged to be developed in the first phase of the East Coast Economic Corridor (linking Kolkata-Chennai-Tuticorin)," said Pradhan in a letter to his union cabinet colleague.
He said given the rich mineral resources and huge availability of manpower in Odisha, such an industrial corridor project is highly necessary to create state-of-the-art infrastructure in the state.
Noting that the Narendra Modi government has conceived the development of various industrial corridor projects for promoting manufacturing and industrial development in the country, he called for planning and implementing an industrial corridor in Odisha to complement the prime minister's vision for development of eastern India.
"Odisha has a well developed network of National Highways. Further, in the Railway Budget of 2016-2017, two dedicated freight corridors has been announced which would be passing through Odisha. The planning of the industrial corridor can be synchronized with the existing and upcoming infrastructure," said Pradhan in his letter.
--IANS
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