By IANS
New Delhi : As India and Japan seek to take their business and strategic ties to new heights, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Monday set the tone for the forthcoming visit by his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, expected late August, saying "a very warm welcome" awaited him.
The two countries have stepped up negotiations on an ambitious $90 billion Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) even as India sought more Japanese investment in infrastructure sector in the country.
When a Japanese business delegation, that included top corporate honchos, led by Japan's Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Akira Amari, called on him, a beaming Manmohan Singh told them: "A very warm welcome awaits Prime Minister Shinzo Abe next month."
Alluding to his "historic and landmark" trip to Tokyo last December, Manmohan Singh stressed on "shared and common values" between India and Japan and raised the bar higher for India-Japan business ties, saying he hoped Tokyo would invest in more projects like the Delhi Metro and the Dedicated Rail Freight Corridor (DFC).
Alluding to the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC), for which the two countries held exhaustive negotiations Monday, Manmohan Singh welcomed a suggestion by Taizo Nishimuro, chairman of the Board of Tokyo Stock Exchange, for deploying Japanese Deposit Receipts (JDRs) to tap nearly $13 trillion of Japanese household savings for investment in India.
"India hopes Japanese capital, technology and enterprise will play an important role in helping us realize our growth potential," he said.
Manmohan Singh and Amari also discussed closer cooperation in developing clean coal and energy efficient technologies.
Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath was upbeat about the prospects of the DMIC after his meeting with Amari.
"DMIC is one of the flagship projects of the growing partnership between India and Japan. This project would have world-class infrastructure with the potential to provide three million jobs in various sectors and tripling the industrial output," Kamal Nath told reporters.
The project entails development of infrastructure along the 1,483-km dedicated freight corridor linking India's top two metros that includes building of airports, setting up of several agro-processing parks and special economic zones, creating 4,000 MW of power generation facility and two ports in Gujarat and Maharashtra.
According to Kamal Nath, with the establishment of the corridor India can look forward to "substantial and quantum jump" in investments by Japanese companies that may total $10 billion in the next five years.
"With this corridor I expect a large number of Japanese companies, especially the small and medium companies, to invest heavily in India by making it a hub for production and exports to Europe and West Asia," Amari said.
The first phase of the project is expected to be completed by 2012.
The project, initiated during Manmohan Singh's Tokyo visit in December 2006, is likely to be finalised during Abe's forthcoming visit to India.
Amari's visit will be followed by another round of meeting and negotiations by stakeholders from both the countries, which is scheduled to take place on July 23-24.