No ease in doing business in India: Reliance think-tank expert quotes top German CEOs who were in India

Modi with Merkel at Hanover in Germany: April 2015

A senior expert, working with the powerful Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL)-run think-tank has said that the top Germans businessmen who had accompanied German Chancellor Angela Merkel to India early this month have outspokenly declared that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has done little to “ease” business environment in India.
The expert, Britta Petersen, who works as senior fellow with the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), quotes Wolfram von Fritsch, Chairperson of Deutsche Messe AG.that Modi had raised “huge expectations” with his 'Make in India' campaign earlier this year at the Hannover in Germany, but “half a year down the line it seems that not much has happened to ease business in India".
Ahead of the German chancellor's vist, a survey by the Indo-German Chamber of Commerce (IGCC) on hindrances of doing business in India in 2015 lists bureaucracy (58 percent), lack of infrastructure (52 percent) and corruption (45 percent) as the main obstacles for companies, followed by tax disputes (32 percent) and lack of skilled people (35 percent), which ORF expert cites to point towards may have gone wrong.
According to the ORF expert Fritsch as also others in the 30-head strong German business delegation, who brought forward their grievances in the meeting that was jointly organised by the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), IGCC, and the Asia Pacific Committee of German Business.
Peterson says, Amitabh Kant, secretary for Industrial Policy and Promotion, may think that "the process of growth" in India has just begun, but German CEOs rather seemed to believe “rating agencies such as Fitch, Moody's and recently the Asian Development Bank (ADB) that cut down India's growth forecast to 7.4 percent from 7.8 percent for this year.”
According to the expert, “For them, this is more than a statistic exercise. Many of the German companies that are already present in India, especially the car and machine building industry, pointed out that they already have over-capacities in India built up during the heydays of the UPA government. And they are afraid to get disappointed by the India story for a second time.”
“Slower economic growth worldwide and a less bullish outlook on India led to a slow-down of the annual trade volume between the two countries. Instead of cracking the much awaited 20-billion Euro mark, it is staggering around 16 billion Euro this year”, says the expert.
“This is all the more regrettable since Germany as one of the leading economies worldwide can play a major role in making Modi's 'Make in India' campaign successful. During the last ten years, German companies have invested more than five billion Euro in India, while Indian companies invested four billion in Germany, conversely”, adds the expert.
The expert quotes Hubert Lienhard, Chairman of the Asia-Pacific Committee of German Business and CEO of Voith, a family-owned mechanical engineering company to say, "At the moment my own company has 20 percent more capacity than we need in the country. I hope that we will meet again here in one year and all the plans of the Indian government have been transformed into action. Then we will continue to invest."
The expert quotes Wolfram von Fritsch of the Deutsche Messe AG as saying that admits he is “already checking on other countries such as Indonesia because a major project that he had planned near Delhi seems to be going nowhere.”
Others had a similar view: Catharina Claas-Muehlhaeuser, who heads the Board of Directors at Claas, one of the world leading producers of agricultural machines, says, "Without infrastructure we will leapfrog nowhere". Adds Siemens CEO Joe Kaeser, says. "Everywhere in the world you have to develop energy and infrastructure first, then comes industry".
“Siemens has been in India for almost 100 years and Kaeser had travelled to India five times this year because his company wants to sell technology for smart cities on a large scale.”, the expert says, quoting him further as saying, "Making one single project work is better than any talk."

Comments

Irrational? Basis for fear among Hindus about being 'swamped' by Muslims

I was amused while reading an article titled "Ham Paanch, Hamare Pachees", shared on Facebook, by well-known policy analyst Mohan Guruswamy, an alumnus of the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University. Guruswamy, who has also worked as an advisor to the Finance Minister with the rank of Secretary to the Government of India, seeks to probe, as he himself states, "the supposed Muslim attitude to family planning"—a theme that was invoked by Narendra Modi as Gujarat Chief Minister ahead of the December 2002 assembly polls.

Why's Australian crackdown rattling Indian students? Whopping 25% fake visa applications

This is what happened several months ago. A teenager living in the housing society where I reside was sent to Australia to study at a university in Sydney with much fanfare. The parents, whom I often met as part of a group, would tell us how easily the boy got his admission with the help of "some well-meaning friends," adding that they had obtained an education loan to ensure he could study at a graduate school.

Tracking a lost link: Soviet-era legacy of Gujarati translator Atul Sawani

The other day, I received a message from a well-known activist, Raju Dipti, who runs an NGO called Jeevan Teerth in Koba village, near Gujarat’s capital, Gandhinagar. He was seeking the contact information of Atul Sawani, a translator of Russian books—mainly political and economic—into Gujarati for Progress Publishers during the Soviet era. He wanted to collect and hand over scanned soft copies, or if possible, hard copies, of Soviet books translated into Gujarati to Arvind Gupta, who currently lives in Pune and is undertaking the herculean task of collecting and making public soft copies of Soviet books that are no longer available in the market, both in English and Indian languages.

Gujarat slips in India Justice Report 2025: From model state to mid-table performer

Overall ranking in IJR reports The latest India Justice Report (IJR), prepared by legal experts with the backing of several civil society organisations and aimed at ranking the capacity of states to deliver justice, has found Gujarat—considered by India's rulers as a model state for others to follow—slipping to the 11th position from fourth in 2022.

Punishing senior citizens? Flipkart, Shopsy stop Cash on Delivery in Ahmedabad!

The other day, someone close to me attempted to order some goodies on Flipkart and its subsidiary Shopsy. After preparing a long list of items, this person, as usual, opted for the Cash on Delivery (popularly known as COD) option, as this senior citizen isn't very familiar with online prepaid payment methods like UPI, credit or debit cards, or online bank transfers through websites. In fact, she is hesitant to make online payments, fearing, "I may make a mistake," she explained, adding, "I read a lot about online frauds, so I always choose COD as it's safe. I have no knowledge of how to prepay online."

A conman, a demolition man: How 'prominent' scribes are defending Pritish Nandy

How to defend Pritish Nandy? That’s the big question some of his so-called fans seem to ponder, especially amidst sharp criticism of his alleged insensitivity during his journalistic career. One such incident involved the theft and publication of the birth certificate of Masaba Gupta, daughter of actor Neena Gupta, in the Illustrated Weekly of India, which Nandy was editing at the time. He reportedly did this to uncover the identity of Masaba’s father.

Of lingering shadow of Haren Pandya's murder during Modi's Gujarat days

Sunita Williams’ return to Earth has, ironically, reopened an old wound: the mysterious murder of her first cousin, the popular BJP leader Haren Pandya, in 2003. Initially a supporter of Narendra Modi, Haren turned against him, not sparing any opportunity to do things that would embarrass Modi. Social media and some online news portals, including The Wire , are abuzz with how Modi’s recent invitation to Sunita to visit India comes against the backdrop of how he, as Gujarat’s chief minister, didn’t care to offer any official protocol support during her 2007 visit to Gujarat.

Area set aside in Ahmedabad for PM's affordable housing scheme 'has gone to big builders'

Following my article on affordable housing in Counterview, which quoted a top real estate consultant, I was informed that affordable housing—a scheme introduced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi—has deviated from its original intent. A former senior bureaucrat, whom I used to meet during my Sachivalaya days, told me that an entire area in Ahmedabad, designated for the scheme, has been used to construct costly houses instead.

Just 5% Gujarat Dalit households 'recognise' social reformers who inspired Ambedkar

An interesting survey conducted across 22 districts and 32 villages in Gujarat sheds light on the representation of key social reformers in Dalit households. It suggests that while Dr. B.R. Ambedkar's photo was displayed in a majority of homes, images of Lord Buddha and the 19th-century reformist couple, Savitribai Phule and Jyotiba Phule, were not as commonly represented.

Search This Blog