By IANS
New Delhi : West Bengal’s pro-reforms Industry Minister Nirupam Sen, inducted into the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) politburo last week, is going all out to attract foreign investment to his state.
He is leaving on a 10-day trip to Germany Thursday to sell West Bengal as an investment destination to the industry captains there. The Indo-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry has organised the visit.
Sen will visit five cities – Munich, Hanover, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Berlin – and try to attract investment in automobile and infrastructure sectors, said an official in Sen’s office.
A delegation of industrialists from Germany has already met the minister in Kolkata to work out the investment plans. A second meeting is scheduled later this month.
Post-Nandigram violence, this is the first major trip abroad by a senior CPI-M minister to woo foreign capital for the state.
Last year, Sen was forced to cancel his visit to the US following renewed violence in Nandigram and restive voices from among Left Front partners like the Communist Party of India (CPI), Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and Forward Bloc.
Sen could revive his plans to visit the US if his Germany tour goes off without provoking protests in West Bengal.
The minister’s office in West Bengal observed that with the unrest at Nandigram dying out, the government could renew its efforts to pump domestic and foreign investments in the state.
“The state assembly’s standing committee on industries has submitted a report indicating that investments can go on,” said an official.