C K Birla Group has evinced interest in making fresh investments in the Telangana State and expanding its business activity by diversifying into medical and health sectors. Birla Group’s chairman C K Birla and managing director of Orient Cement (a Birla group company) Deepak Khetrapal, met Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao at Secretariat on Saturday and expressed interest in investing in Telangana in the areas of cement manufacturing and medical/health.
The Birla Group is already operating its Orient Cement plant at Devapur in Adilabad. The investment proposal from the Birla Group comes close on the heels of several corporates showing their interest to invest in Telangana. So far, Tata Advanced Systems, ITC, Microsoft and Ikea have come forward to expand their business in Hyderabad and parts of Telangana.
The Birla Group said it was optimistic and looking forward to an industry-friendly State policy from the Telangana government. The policy could be the country’s first of its kind. The Group shared its plans to expand its cement manufacturing activity and invest in medical/health sector and sought support from the State government. The Chief Minister assured the government’s support to the Group’s plans. The Birla Group’s proposal to expand cement manufacturing in Telangana comes at a time when the realty sector in the State is fighting a cold war with the cement cartel, which is refusing to roll back the cement prices that went up recently from Rs 195 to Rs 310. A joint action committee has gone on a consecutive cement purchase holiday weeks starting July 5, 2014 extending up to July 26 now, to put pressure on the cement manufacturers to reduce prices to reasonable and logical levels. If Birla’s Orient Cement can provide the needed cement supplies, the realtors in the State could find relief.
KCR said the State government was allocating about 2.5 lakh acres for industries through Telangana State Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (TSIIC) and it would closely oversee that the companies willing to invest in the State would get the needed support through speedy approvals. To make it possible, the State is in the process of establishing a unique single window mechanism with an exclusive chasing cell attached to the Chief Minister’s Office. The system will allow issuing clearances to projects within two to three weeks. “State will develop industrial parks on par with China and create a corruption-free environment for the industry. Also, the government will take steps to avoid all unnecessary bottlenecks in the project approvals to avoid issues at regional level. Companies nationally are exploring investment opportunities in Telangana,” the CM said.
