Hit by outages, Ludhiana bizmen turn to UP

Shivani Bhakoo

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, July 13

Industrialists from Ludhiana who had gone to Uttar Pradesh to meet the Chief Minister and other top officials have claimed that a list of over 50 industries, which have shown interest in investing in the state, has been handed over to the UP Government.

50 units interested

At a meeting with the UP Chief Minister, industrialists submitted a list of over 50 industries interested in investing in the state. In return, they got details of land available, sops, including 24-hour power supply

These industries include yarn, steel parts, dyeing units, cycle parts, textile, etc. The UP Government has reportedly mentioned about the land available for Punjab industries in different districts.

TR Mishra, chairman, Federation of Dyeing Factories Association, who headed the delegation, said: “The UP Government has promised to provide many sops — 24-hour uninterrupted power supply within a week of submitting documents, all NOCs under single window, cheap labour, no visit by inspectors, etc.”

They have reportedly been provided a list of the chunk of land available for setting up units near Jamuna Expressway, Mathura, Old Allahabad, Gorakhpur, entire area of Purvanchal express from Gorakhpur to Mau, Bundelkhand, etc. “In Punjab, there has been no industrial revolution. The industry can’t be ignored, which provides huge revenue to the state, labour to lakhs of people, etc,” said Mishra, hoping that big and medium units from Ludhiana will soon start expanding base in UP.

A top bureaucrat said: “At 12 per cent, UP has the maximum cognizable crime (2017) in the country. With such high crime rate, how can you invest massively in the state? In Punjab, the crime rate is just 1.4 per cent. The industry here is disturbed just because of power situation, which will improve in the next few days.”

In the past four years, Punjab has received 2,900 proposals worth over Rs 91,000 crore investment. Of the 2,900 project proposals received by the state in the past four years, more than 50 per cent have already started commercial operations.