Top honchos to skip Resurgent Rajasthan summit

Several top industrialists are likely to follow Prime Minister Narendra Modi in skipping the Resurgent Rajasthan summit, taking the sheen off chief minister Vasundhara Raje’s pet project aimed at showcasing the state as an attractive investment destination.

The two-day summit starting Thursday will be inaugurated by Union finance minister Arun Jaitley.

Official sources said though the state government had sent an invite to the Prime Minister’s Office, they did not respond.

“They have neither accepted nor refused it,” an official added.

Sources said that though the government had drawn up a list of 80 top investors to be state guests but now only 50 remained.

Also, no memoranda of understanding (MoUs) were likely to be signed during the event, the sources added. Earlier, the government had planned to sign some MoUs in Modi’s presence.

The Congress mocked the PM saying that while he had time to hop from one country to the other, he did not have time to visit an Indian state.

“It shows a lack of coordination between the state and the Central governments but it could also be for the embarrassment that the Centre faced due to the Lalitgate (issue) and the mining scam (in which a senior IAS officer is behind bars),” said Archana Sharma, state vice-president of the party.

First Published: Nov 18, 2015 14:07 IST