Gujarat CM holds road show in city to woo industrialists and Bollywood

Among the industrialists Patel met were Mukesh Ambani, chairman , Reliance Industries, N Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Sons Pvt Ltd, S N Subrahmanyan, chairman of Larsen & Toubro, Dipak Gupta, MD and CEO of Kotak Mahindra, Sanjiv Puri, chairman and MD of ITC Limited, Jai Shroff, chairman of UPL, and Kaku Nakhate, president and country head of the Bank of America

Mumbai: Months after his Uttar Pradesh counterpart held a road show to attract investment from Maharashtra, Gujarat chief minister Bhupendra Patel did the same in Mumbai on Wednesday. Patel held one-on-one meetings with leading city industrialists and also met Bollywood personalities to woo them to shoot their films in Gujarat.

Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel at the 10th Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit - 2024. (Bhushan Koyande/HT Photo)

The Gujarat CM declared that if Mumbai was the financial capital of the country, Gujarat was the most favoured destination for investment, and projects like the bullet train connecting Mumbai and Gujarat would benefit both. “Apart from the bullet train, 38 percent of the Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor is in Gujarat and will prove beneficial logistically to Mumbai and Gujarat,” he said.

Gujarat’s chief secretary Raj Kumar said the bullet train would provide huge opportunities of synergy between the IFSC headquartered at GIFT city in Gandhinagar and the financial services market in Mumbai. “The IFSC is fast developing as an offshore center for global finances, and it will help meet the country’s financial needs,” he said. “After the success of Phase 1 of GIFT City, we are planning Phase 2, which will be triple the size of the existing phase.”

Among the industrialists Patel met were Mukesh Ambani, chairman , Reliance Industries, N Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Sons Pvt Ltd, S N Subrahmanyan, chairman of Larsen & Toubro, Dipak Gupta, MD and CEO of Kotak Mahindra, Sanjiv Puri, chairman and MD of ITC Limited, Jai Shroff, chairman of UPL, and Kaku Nakhate, president and country head of the Bank of America. During his meetings, he highlighted the policies rolled out by the government for various sectors and extended an invitation to industries and industrial leaders to participate in the Vibrant Gujarat event from January 10 to 12 next year.

In his meeting with producers, directors and actors from Bollywood, the CM appealed to them to choose Gujarat for their shootings. “We have rolled out a shooting-friendly policy for the film industry,” he said. “We are also holding the Filmfare Awards function in Gujarat next year, which will help us boost tourism and the cultural and transport sectors and generate jobs in large numbers. There are immense opportunities in Gujarat for the entertainment industry, and it should grab these.”

Opposition parties in Maharashtra attacked the BJP and its coalition partners for their support to the road show. Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut dissed Eknath Shinde, saying that while the CM had never gone to Lucknow, Ahmedabad or Delhi to attract investment for Maharashtra, he was supporting the Vibrant Gujarat event. “This is because of his helplessness before the BJP leadership,” said Raut. “Projects in Maharashtra are shifting to Gujarat. This will demean the industrial importance of our state.”

Shinde-led Shiv Sena leader and industries minister Uday Samant hit back at Raut, saying that no project had shifted to Gujarat. “The opposition has developed the habit of lying to people,” he said. “We don’t pay heed to such allegations; our stress is on development works.”

The opposition has been criticising the Shinde government for the projects that allegedly went to Gujarat after the government came to power in June last year. It also attacked the government for the road show held by UP CM Yogi Adityanath in Mumbai in February.