The Maldives is keen to seek investments from India and other countries, Ahmed Mohamed, the country’s High Commissioner to India has said.

“The new Government would like to achieve the planned development goals in a speedy manner,” the envoy told BusinessLine. He invited businesses from India to invest in his country.

High Commission officials pointed out that the new Maldivian Government has removed “hurdles and road bumps” for a Tata housing project. Besides, it has also been easing the process of doing business by initiating several steps, including setting up Special Economic Zones.

The website of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs shows that the Taj Group has two resorts in Maldives while Tata Housing Development Company has taken up a project to construct 1,000 low-cost housing units in Malé.

The Bengaluru-headquartered GMR Group had earlier taken up the modernisation of Male airport. But in December 2012, the Maldives Government cancelled the group’s contract for the Male Ibrahim Nasir International Airport.

Declining to comment on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s cancellation of his visit to Maldives as part of a tour of the Indian Ocean island nation states of Seychelles, Mauritius and Sri Lanka, High Commission officials indicated that relations between India and Maldives continued as usual.

In this context they mentioned how the Indian Government had responded positively and immediately to a request by the Maldives Government last Sunday to evacuate two of its students who were stuck in war-torn Yemen.

S Jaishankar, Foreign Secretary, had told newspersons that a visit of the Prime Minister can only be cancelled if it has been announced and India had never announced the visit.

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