Japanese investors keen to invest in India’s infra sector: Arun Jaitley

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, kick starting his 6-day visit to Japan aimed at attracting investments from Asia's second biggest economy, has said that Japanese investors are keen to invest in India’s infra sector. Jaitley said that Japanese conglomerate SoftBank and a number of other investors have shown keen interest in investing in India’s infrastructure growth story.

Jaitley after a meeting with SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son stated that “There are people who want to participate in infrastructure growth story. For example, at the SoftBank meeting we just had, they are looking at one of the biggest investments in solar power already.” In June last year, Soft-Bank announced that the group was forming a joint venture with Bharti Enterprises and Taiwan's Foxconn Technology Group to invest about $20 billion in renewable energy in India. Son on his part said that “India has a great future... We are interested in investing for Internet companies, also for solar energy. We would make a strong commitment.”

During the visit, Jaitley will also call on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo and will attend the 22nd International Conference on 'The Future of Asia' organised by Nikkei Inc. Jaitley will also meet Osamu Suzuki, Chairman of Suzuki Motor, the biggest Japanese investor in automobile sector in India and will participate in 'The Future of Asia' conference and will deliver keynote address at the roundtable on National Investment & Infrastructure Fund (NIIF).

The government is looking at attracting investors to the Rs 40,000-crore NIIF, which is an investment vehicle for funding commercially viable greenfield, brown-field and stalled projects. Its creation was announced in the Union Budget 2015-16, the objective of NIIF is to maximize economic impact mainly through infrastructure development in commercially viable projects, both greenfield and brownfield, including stalled projects. It could also consider other nationally important projects, for example, in manufacturing, if commercially viable.