Comments
The US-India CEO Forum is likely to meet in September in Washington and efforts are on by the business communities to ensure that both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Barack Obama attend it.
Honeywell CEO David Cote, who co-chairs the Forum with Tata Group chief Cyrus Mistry, met Modi on Wednesday, and pressed on the need to make the forum a platform for initiating policy changes in areas such as defence, renewable energy, healthcare and intellectual property, a government official told BusinessLine .
“PM Modi is likely to be in Washington in September for the UN Summit.
That is when the US CEOs are keen to hold the CEO Forum so that both Modi and Obama could attend,” the official added.
Defence focus Cote also met Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and a senior team of officials from the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) led by Secretary Amitabh Kant, after his meeting with the Prime Minister. “The US industry is specifically focussed on the defence sector. While Cote did not insist that the FDI cap in the sector be raised from 49 per cent to 51 per cent, he indicated that cooperation in the sector would strengthen if more foreign investment is allowed to flow in,” the official said.
The US-India CEO Forum met in January in Delhi during US President Obama’s visit. Both Obama and Modi had attended the meeting and promised to address concerns raised by businesses of the two countries.
Following the meeting, the Forum submitted a report highlighting the changes needed in areas such as defence industrial cooperation, IPR and renewable energy.
Seeks concrete action “Cote said he wanted the CEO Forum to lead to concrete action in areas wherever there is scope for improvement,” the official said.
India has already set up an inter-ministerial committee to fast-track decisions related to problems faced by US companies that have invested in India.
The US is the sixth largest investor in India with total investments worth $ 13.62 billion flowing into the country since 2000.
In April-February 2014-15, the US invested around $ 1.7 billion in India.
Comments
COMMENT NOW
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.