Mumbai: Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis is on a five-day trip to Japan, hoping to pitch some of the state’s showpiece infrastructure projects to Japanese agencies for investments.
During the visit, which began Sunday and will conclude on 25 August, Fadnavis will be a state guest of the Japanese government — an honour usually accorded to heads of state. Prior to this, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had been invited by the government of Japan to visit the country as a state guest in 2013 when he was chief minister of Gujarat.
Fadnavis’s visit is a new beginning aimed at strengthening the friendship and collaboration between Maharashtra and Japan, said sources.
During his visit, the deputy chief minister accompanied by officials of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) and state government’s industries department will meet senior officials from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), Japan External Trade Organization (JETRA) and JERA — Japan’s biggest power generator — to facilitate investment for projects in Maharashtra, sources added.
The visit comes at a time when the Shiv Sena-BJP government in the state has been caught in the Opposition’s glare over big-ticket projects eyed by Maharashtra going to neighbouring Gujarat. These include a semiconductor plant that was to be set up by Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn in partnership with Indian conglomerate Vedanta and a Rs 22,000-crore Tata-Airbus production facility for military transport aircraft.
Devendra Fadnavis had initiated talks with Japan to seek investment for infrastructure projects in the state as chief minister between 2014 and 2019.
Upon his arrival at the Narita International Airport in Chiba Monday, Fadnavis received a Marathi-styled welcome from members of the Indian diaspora who were seen singing the ‘Labhale Amhas Bhagya‘ and chanting slogans in praise of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. “Just the way my family welcomes me home, the same way I got welcomed in Japan. I am extremely grateful for their love and hospitality,” Fadnavis wrote on X.
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🕣8.30am JST | 🕔5am IST
21-8-2023 📍Narita International Airport.जपानमध्ये महाराष्ट्राच्या संस्कृतीचे दर्शन!
आज जपान दौर्याच्या पहिल्याच दिवशी विमानतळावर उतरल्याबरोबर महाराष्ट्राच्या संस्कृतीचे अभूतपूर्व दर्शन घडले. जपानमध्ये स्थित भारतीयांनी विमानतळावर माझे जंगी… pic.twitter.com/bB31TjiCvi
— Devendra Fadnavis (@Dev_Fadnavis) August 21, 2023
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Sources added that during Fadnavis’s ongoing visit, the MMRDA is likely to seek investment from JICA for various projects including the proposed twin tunnels below the Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP), the Versova-Virar Sea Link and the Thane coastal road project.
Fadnavis — whose pet project the Mumbai-Nagpur Samruddhi Mahamarg is now partially functional — may also seek investment for the proposed Nagpur-Goa expressway. The deputy CM, along with officials from the MMRDA, will also discuss probable investments with Japanese companies like Sumitomo Corporation, NTT, and Sony, sources added.
On the first day of his visit, Fadnavis boarded the bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto, where he said one can learn a lot from the Japanese. “The public transport and infrastructure is obviously robust but it is fascinating to witness the people following every rule religiously, lane discipline, automated quick ticketing systems, platform safety, every rule.”
Apart from holding meetings to seek investment, Fadnavis will also take part in cultural programmes during his five-day visit.
Fadnavis had embarked on a similar five-day trip to Japan as chief minister in September 2015. During that visit, he unveiled a statue of Dr BR Ambedkar at Koyasan University in Wakayama and also held consultations with leaders of industry in a bid to net investments for the state.
Following his visit, JICA invested in a number of arterial infrastructure projects in Maharashtra including the Mumbai Trans-Harbour Link (MTHL), the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail Corridor (“bullet train”) and the Mumbai Metro-3 line, among others.
Launched in 2017, the “bullet train” project was slated for completion in 2023 but delays in land acquisition have led to slow implementation. Eighty percent of funding for the project was provided through a soft loan by JICA at an interest rate of 0.1 percent. In a meeting with Consul-General of Japan in Mumbai Fukahori Yasukata last July, Devendra Fadnavis had assured him that projects funded by the JICA will be fast-tracked.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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