Loosen red tape, get investment, NRIs tell Govt
When state officials come to France or other European countries, they expect our hospitality.
But when we come here, they just refuse to take care of us."

AHMEDABAD, JANUARY 13, 2005
TIMES NEWS NETWORK

: A large number of non-resident Gujaratis (NRGs) attending the Vibrant Gujarat summit believe that the government's long-time hang-up with the prohibition policy is mainly responsible for their poor investment in the state.

In a pledged investment blitzkrieg of over Rs 1 lakh crore announced at the summit, the NRI inflow was a trickle. This despite the fact that out of a total of 5,000 investor-delegates, around 1,000 were NRIs. Nishit Desai, a Mumbaibased consultant working with the state finance department to set up the NRI Infrastructure Fund and an NRI Charitable Fund, believes, "One should not underestimate the need to remove prohibition. One should understand and respect the changed lifestyle of NRIs if one wants their investment in Gujarat."

Sunil Nayak of the Apex Hospitality Corporation of the US is proposing a Rs 70-crore convention centre in Ahmedabad and a beach resort somewhere around Ahmedpur-Mandvi on the Saurashtra coast. He says, "There is lot of more interest in Gujarat than last year", but emphatically adds, "If I want to invest in a beach resort, I would not like to lose out on states where alcoholic drinks are easily available.

I will have to think about this aspect before signing an MoU." He says it's wrong to think NRIs do not want to put their money in Gujarat. "They invest in a big way in hotels in the US, why shouldn't they do that here if good returns are guaranteed?" Darkesh Shah, an NRI who met Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, has a printing machine firm in Stuttgart.

He complains, "It is unfortunate that the government thinks only big. There are NRIs like us who want to invest in small and medium-scale projects." Pointing out that this was particularly possible in the tourism sector, he adds, "Prohibition is a problem".

"There is a need to relax it at least on the beaches, otherwise how can tourists come to Gujarat?" A France-based NRI, Shambhu Patel, who heads the Federation of Gujarati Samaj of Europe and who has brought dozen people from his country, believes that the government's response is "not up to our expectations".

He complains, "When state officials come to France or other European countries, they expect our hospitality. But when we come here, they just refuse to take care of us."

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