Bengal businesses show interest : Telangana

Kolkata, Oct 16 : Bengal business houses have shown interest in investing in Telangana and a city-based business group has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the recently-created state in packaged food segment, a Telangana minister said on Monday.

"We have met several business houses, staring with Emami, to discuss a number of potential business opportunities. We met RP Sanjiv Goenka group and entered into an MoU with them for a specific expansion plan for packaged food," state Industries and Commerce Minister K.T. Rama Rao said here.

He said his state's officials also met other Kolkata-based business houses like Srei Group and had one-on-one meetings with Keventer Agro, Titagarh Wagons, mjunction and others.

"With Emami, we discussed for cement plants, bio-fuel businesses and Srei Group has significant investments in the state. Keventer looks for a food testing lab and we are keen to get that in our state," Rao said.

The state has two lakh acres of land with the Telangana State Industrial Investment Corporation (TSIIC) for industrial usage, he said during the roadshow organised here by CII.

"In the last three years of our existence, we have been able to attract top companies. Top five technology companies -- Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon -- have their offices in the state. These offices are the largest office outside their headquarters in the US and these are cutting edge R&D centres, not KPOs or BPOs," he said.

According to him, Telangana introduced the industrial policy two years ago and since then the state has cleared more than 4,400 units and attracted nearly Rs 80,000 crore of investments "out of which, more than half is in the commercial production stage," the minister said. 

The state had planned to set up a dry port near Hyderabad in public-private partnership mode, he added.